Where is Alexei drafted next year?

[Old_Style]

He has a lot more speed than power, and if he was allowed to run according, he'd have over 40 SB.

He's definitely a burner. It didn't seem like he took the opportunity to take a base when he could have, or he just made poor decisions on when to try to steal a base. A year of MLB experience, and getting to know pitchers' tendencies, may help in that department though.

[GotowarMissAgnes]

He has a lot more speed than power, and if he was allowed to run according, he'd have over 40 SB.

Stealing bases isn't simply about speed. It's also about opportunity and judgement. He attempted 22 steals last year and got caught 9 times. That's horrible judgement.

He may improve, as he learns more about pitcher's moves and such. But, that SB rate is in line with his Cuban numbers, suggesting he's just a bad judge of the risks.

But, his attempts may also be cut down for 2 reasons. First, if that's the best he can do for a success rate, a smart manager is going to start taking more control over when he gets the green light (OK, so maybe that's irrelevant with the Sox). In addition, however, everything I've heard says he's going to bat #2. That's going to cut his SB attempts batting in front of the #3/4 hitters and behind the lead off guy.

And I'm not sure where you get the idea about power and speed. Even in Cuba he had twice as many HRs as SBs.

[rmande09]

I have the 3rd pick in a 12-team, 6-player keeper league (so 75th overall), and I am targeting him with that pick - assuming he isn't kept and falls from the first two picks.

[duckbillgates]

Sixth round seems about right based on upside, although that certainly isn't a safe pick. He put up pretty great numbers running on raw talent last year.

That position eligibility is tough to ignore. He looks like a Top 5-6 pick at both shortstop and 2B. It's pretty nice to have that flexibility in a draft.

I think he's going to be my gamble keeper in a 12-team, six-keeper league this year (although his low KO numbers boost him in that league).

[Neato Torpedo]

He has a lot more speed than power, and if he was allowed to run according, he'd have over 40 SB.

Stealing bases isn't simply about speed. It's also about opportunity and judgement. He attempted 22 steals last year and got caught 9 times. That's horrible judgement.

He may improve, as he learns more about pitcher's moves and such. But, that SB rate is in line with his Cuban numbers, suggesting he's just a bad judge of the risks.

But, his attempts may also be cut down for 2 reasons. First, if that's the best he can do for a success rate, a smart manager is going to start taking more control over when he gets the green light (OK, so maybe that's irrelevant with the Sox). In addition, however, everything I've heard says he's going to bat #2. That's going to cut his SB attempts batting in front of the #3/4 hitters and behind the lead off guy.

And I'm not sure where you get the idea about power and speed. Even in Cuba he had twice as many HRs as SBs.

I'm talking about raw speed. If he gets a lot of in-depth time working on improving his intelligence on the basepaths, he'll become a real threat on the basepaths. Also, can you link to his Cuba stats? I've been looking for them for a while.

[Wheelhouse]

it's been reported that the sox want to focus on alexei's baserunning in spring training, so i would expect him to run more next year, not less, and at a better %

[GotowarMissAgnes]

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/artic ... cleid=8152

You know, he's 27 years old. He stunk at stealing bases in Cuba where he got thrown out 29 times in 67 attempts. He didn't show up any better in MLB. At some point you gotta recognize that no matter how hard he works at improving, he's not very good at it. Having been a pro player for more than half a decade, I'm leaning towards the opinion that it's simply not something he's good at.

[rmande09]

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=8152

You know, he's 27 years old. He stunk at stealing bases in Cuba where he got thrown out 29 times in 67 attempts. He didn't show up any better in MLB. At some point you gotta recognize that no matter how hard he works at improving, he's not very good at it. Having been a pro player for more than half a decade, I'm leaning towards the opinion that it's simply not something he's good at.

Gotta wonder what kind of coaching Alexei was receiving for base stealing in Cuba. I'd venture a guess that it wasn't quite as good as what he'll experience in the spring with the Sox this year.

Last year, I doubt much emphasis was placed on base stealing for Alexei. There was probably much more focus on his adaptation to the U.S. and getting him ready to play in the Majors; doubt there was too much by way of specifics. After a full season of watching Alexei develop and seeing what he can do, the Sox know that a major focus for him needs to be base running. I'm not saying he's going to start swiping bags at a 90% rate or anything, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if he saw some pretty serious improvement.

[Yoda]

I still think Alexei is too risky. I guess if you have a roster full of safe picks up until he comes up then it wouldn't be a terrible idea to go with him. The problem is that we have no idea what he will do (same goes for Longoria) and that is why I don't like him so much.

[GotowarMissAgnes]

Given that Cuban teams are often very competitive in international play, I'd suspect the coaching is pretty good myself. And he's had all of February-October to demonstrate any improvement from coaching without any success so far. He was 7 for 11 before the ASB and 6 for 11 afterwards. Maybe you can take something from his 3 for 4 performance in September, but that's a pretty small sample against a lot of second tier catchers.

Stranger things have happened, but as rotoauthority demonstrates with their analysis of spring training cliches, a lot of this bs about what players are trying to improve never pans out.