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Eric Longenhagen Prospects Chat
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Eric A Longenhagen
12:45
It's possible Ford just doesn't hit.
12:49
But to your question... I don't know who the decision makers there came to want Lyon. It's possible someone liked him during the course of their 2025 travels working for their old team. He's a pitchability guy with good secondary stuff, we like him. Maybe the strategy was to take a player who was recently drafted to maximize their time in the org and the area scout or crosschecker might have liked him.
Padilla
12:49
Yairo Padilla's physical projection looks great. But I am concerned about the GB%. Are there any successful examples of guys going from 50% GB in the low minors to valuable power hitters launching fly balls?
mmddyyyy
12:50
Where is the center of the baseball world?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:52
I'm not sure there's a good answer to this. The density of baseball humans feels greatest at winter meetings but it feels silly to say WMs when here are so few players there.
Tom
12:53
Emmanuel Rodriguez tore up the Dominican Winter League, and should be in early consideration for a debut next season...if he can stay on the field. What caliber prospect do you consider him specifically, and more broadly, how do you go about discounting a player's physical talents by his actual availability (likewise for other injury-prone guys like DeLauter, Jenkins, Espino, etc)?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:54
Honestly with the oft-injured guys I feel like it's best to take them off the board while you're lining up everyone else and then just gut-feel place the injured dudes when you're at the end of the process. Rodriguez feels like Trent Grisham to me, and i'm talking like the entirety of the career arc, not just 2025 Grish.
JD
12:54
Rumors that teams asking for Brito in deals and Astros balking.  Would you include him in a deal for a pitcher like Baz?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:55
If you think you can make more of Baz, then maybe. If you think Baz is what he is, then no.
Baz's best role, if the cement is dry on him, is in the bullpen, roughly in the same sort of role I expect Brito to occupy
Give me more years of Brito
urub
12:56
No longer a prospect, but what's your guess what happens with Dalton Rushing? Isn't he good enough for a starting job somewhere?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:56
He is but that doesn't mean they have to trade him.
12:57
It'd probably take a real blockbuster for me to move him.
Green apple
12:57
So will Reds Hector Rodriguez be ready for the show in 26? 50 FV ?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:57
I'm working on the Reds list right now and am going to make you wait.
ABS before leg day
12:58
This is around the time MILB teams do all their hiring for 2026. How hectic was it for you trying to break in with Lehigh Valley?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:01
I interviewed in Allentown at the building on Union Blvd just outside the stadium with Lindsey Knupp, who grew up one town over from me and played field hockey at Bloomsburg? Shippensburg? One of those. She works for the Trash Pandas now. I did not see her at the Meetings.
1:02
I lived nearby and they knew I'd show up. I was the youngest one.
Jonathan
1:02
Alec Blair left Oklahoma's basketball program after one game and plans to focus exclusively on baseball.  Does this at all change how you view him as a prospect with respect to risk?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:03
I guess if focusing on baseball allows him to develop more quickly as a hitter, then it will have done that. But I'm not suddenly juicing his grade just because he gave up basketball.
Insert Witty Name Here
1:03
WTF is going on with the Iggles? Is Hurts saving his running for the playoffs? Why can’t they find a professional offensive coordinator who knows how to professionally design and call plays?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:05
The rest of the apparatus needs to be operating in rarified air if the QB has these throwing limitations. Last year's O line and Saquon gave them the shot to bust 40+ yarders at any time. That's not been present this year. Without that they can't be the best team.
Jonathan
1:06
If IBM came to you and said, "Eric, let's build a custom Large Language Model and for its corpus let's use every single scouting report you've written along with players' statistics", do you think you'd discover anything new about either scouting or your own proclivities and how they've changed over time?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:06
Almost certainly
JT
1:07
Anything on the Angels’ Yilver de Paula or the Royals’ Freddy Contreras?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:08
De Paula played 10 DSL games and wasn't at all on my radar until you asked this question, I have nothing. Contreras 94-97 touch an 8, below avg breaking ball spin on an 80-ish mph slurve thing.
Green apple
1:08
Does Cam Collier still project as big league regular ?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:09
I fell in love with his feel to hit in the AFL.
Redbeard
1:09
Not sure how close of attention you pay to guys like Murakami, but is there any hope he get above a 30 grade down the road
Eric A Longenhagen
1:09
This is bait, right?
Scotty
1:09
Happy Friday, Eric. After doing the Dodgers list... in a vacuum as it stands today, would you trade Hope/Ferris for Michael Busch?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:10
At his moment you'd rather have the busch end of the deal in a vacuum
Will
1:10
If you were GM for one of the teams with starting pitchers on the block, who would you target from the O's org?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:10
De Leon
Green apple
1:10
Have you read the Bloomberg piece from Oct 31 re: parents spending big on youth baseball ? Makes me wonder how many kids from the sports missing
Eric A Longenhagen
1:11
I actually didn't read that so thank you for alerting me of it. Let's make reading that a group homework assignment for next week.
sliderguy35
1:11
we know a lot on the publiv side about how pitchers with lower spin efficiencies and higher spin capacity usually have more avenues to expand their pitch mix later on. Is this something you think is going to become more prevalent in scouting discussion around pitchers moving forward?
Eric A Longenhagen
1:13
I think what I'm more apt to argue for is that difference-making characteristics of any kind should be more present in discussions rather than any one trait. Let's turn over rocks looking for guys who do stuff at a 7 or 8 level, no matter what measurable trait we're looking for.
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