Thursday, February 9, 2012

Down on the Farm: #46 Ray Black

#46 Ray Black, RHP. 6'5", 225 lbs. BD:

College(Pitt): 1-1, 6.62, 18 IP, 24 BB, 30 K's, 4 Saves.

Ray Black is another big, strong fireballing college bullpen guy. He had TJ surgery coming out of HS and redshirted his freshman year. He then hurt his knee and only pitched 17 innings in 2010. He didn't pitch a lot of innings in 2011 either, probably because of walk rates that make Bryce Bandilla look like a finesse pitcher by comparison. His FB sits at 94-97 MPH with a slider in the mid 80's. The 7'th round of the draft is a great place to take a risk on a guy like this. He's probably a longshot to ever get his stuff under control, but if he ever does, the Giants have themselves a dominant bullpen arm.

5 comments:

  1. Speaking Ray, or you can call him Jay :^), sfgiants.com has their Giants Top 20 prospect list out, and they list Ray Black as one of their sleepers: http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20120209&content_id=26624726&vkey=news_sf&c_id=sf&partnerId=rss_sf

    They also mentioned someone I never heard of before, Joe Biagini. Big guy, typical Giants size, 6'4", 215 lbs. Just FYI.

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  2. Thanks for the heads up on Mayo. I like the MLB site because you can get video on the draft guys. Is he feeling footsteps, expanding to 20? There weren't any surprises, but its good to see Galindo getting so much national rep. Now all he has to do is keep it up.

    Black looks to be a beast as well. Have I mentioned I really like our 2011 draft?

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    1. Ha, yes, you have. :^)

      np, thought others would like to see the list too, even if there is a big error in the article, they list Panik 3rd there, but in the text and the Top 20, he is 7th. I found that to be a big surprise, him being so low. I just don't think he buys it yet, I think he was one of the ones who thought Panik was an overdraft (which he noted), but other noted prospect analysts (Perfect Game and Sickels) though that Panik was OK where he was selected, not a big stretch, in fact, PG thought that Panik had rose enough that they would not be surprised if he were the first MI selected. Yeah, the videos are really nice, I like that too.

      Could be, regarding the 20, because Goldstein/BP had been started with Top 11 rankings for a while, but last year started his "Plus 9" to reach 20 in total. And the Minor League Baseball Analyst book has been providing Top 15 for a while now, since it started. And Sickels usually covered 20+ prospects and gave grades on them.

      Of course, BA has always had their Top 30. They are the gold standard, so maybe instead of footsteps, they are instead stepping up or catching up? Or both?

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    2. I like Mayo. I've talked about the high comedy of watching the draft on MLB network - Mayo scrambling and not being able to get far enough back on his video draft board for Panik (he had him in the late 50s early 60s) and everybody scrambling around after being prepared for all the other picks. Then the draft room with Sabes & co looking all pleased with themselves. It was awesome... for baseball geeks.

      BA is still the gold standard. I really like Sickels the best. And Keith Law came out with his list. A few MCC'ers swooned over the sheer awesomeness and whined about the absence of Giants on the list. The more I pay attention to prospects the less respect I have for Law. If he had any sand he would have taken the Houston job, if it was actually offered. That is a gateway to GM, and that should be every scout/stats geeks dream. Law picks low hanging snark points and makes no big shot calls, and never admits any errors. Is this starting to sound familiar? OK, better stop now.

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    3. I like Mayo too. It was his mock draft and draft day predictions that gave me the idea that we might be able to draft Tim Lincecum. Now, he got the pick wrong - he had the Giants selecting Bard, who then fell to the Red Sox - but still, he's been pretty stellar with the first 10 picks every year, getting a good number of them correct.

      That must have been priceless seeing that when Panik was picked.

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