{"id":9789,"date":"2014-09-25T12:32:12","date_gmt":"2014-09-25T16:32:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=9789"},"modified":"2014-09-25T12:32:12","modified_gmt":"2014-09-25T16:32:12","slug":"nats-minor-league-players-of-the-year-indicator-of-future-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=9789","title":{"rendered":"Nats Minor League Players of the Year; indicator of future success?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_9671\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/SouzaStephen-Nats-offical-TommyGilligan.jpg.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-9671\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-9671\" alt=\"Souza gets well-deserved recognition from the team.   Photo Nats official\/Tommy Gilligan\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/SouzaStephen-Nats-offical-TommyGilligan.jpg-300x168.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"168\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/SouzaStephen-Nats-offical-TommyGilligan.jpg-300x168.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/SouzaStephen-Nats-offical-TommyGilligan.jpg.jpg 640w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-9671\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Souza gets well-deserved recognition from the team. Photo Nats official\/Tommy Gilligan<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The Nationals on 9\/24\/14 <a href=\"http:\/\/m.nationals.mlb.com\/news\/article\/96218262\/steven-souza-jr-lucas-giolito-take-home-nats-organization-awards\">announced<\/a> that <strong>Lucas Giolito<\/strong> and <strong>Steven Souza<\/strong> were named their minor league players of the\u00a0year for 2014 (announcement made on twitter, h\/t to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.federalbaseball.com\/2014\/9\/24\/6839805\/nationals-name-lucas-giolito-steven-souza-minor-league-awards\">FederalBaseball for the initial posting<\/a> on the topic).<\/p>\n<p>No surprise for Souza, who sported an OPS above 1.000 in AAA.\u00a0 I was a bit surprised Giolito got the nod over someone like <strong>Taylor Hill,\u00a0<\/strong><strong>Austin Voth<\/strong>&#8216;s 2-level rise, or especially what <strong>A.J. Cole<\/strong> did this year, but you cannot argue with his season all in all.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s an look though at the history of the Nats&#8217; minor league players of the year.\u00a0 Does earning the award guarantee future success?<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>2014: Steven Souza, Lucas Giolito<\/li>\n<li>2013: Billy Burns, Taylor Jordan<\/li>\n<li>2012: Matt Skole,\u00a0Nathan Karns (also BA&#8217;s two POTY for the org)<\/li>\n<li>2011: Steve Lombardozzi, Brad Peacock<\/li>\n<li>2010: Tyler Moore, Tommy Milone<\/li>\n<li>2009: Derek Norris, Brad Meyers<\/li>\n<li>2008: Leonard Davis, Jordan Zimmermann<\/li>\n<li>2007: Justin Maxwell, John Lannan<\/li>\n<li>2006: Kory Casto, Zech Zinicola<\/li>\n<li>2005: Kory Casto, Mike O&#8217;Conner<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I&#8217;d say that it is quite hit or miss.\u00a0 Of the 9 distinct hitters named in the Nats franchise history, I think the only guy you could claim has lived up to his minor league success is <strong>Derek Norris<\/strong>.\u00a0 <strong>Leonard Davis<\/strong> never even made the majors.\u00a0 <strong>Kory Casto<\/strong> barely did: hitting below .200 in parts of two major leagues seasons before getting DFA&#8217;d.\u00a0 Most of the rest of these guys at best are no more than role players (with &#8220;too early to tell&#8221; labels on <strong>Skole<\/strong> and <strong>Souza<\/strong> of course).<\/p>\n<p>Of the pitchers; clearly <strong>Jordan Zimmermann<\/strong> has blossomed into the real thing, and a couple of the other names here have turned into serviceable #4\/#5 starters (<strong>Lannan, Milone<\/strong>).\u00a0 Perhaps its indicative of just how poor the farm system was upon the team&#8217;s arrival in Washington that the first two pitchers of the system were a guy who never pitched in the majors (<strong>Zinicola<\/strong>) and another who had a career 5.30 ERA in 35 MLB apperances over several years.\u00a0 <strong>Meyers<\/strong> never came back from a shoulder injury; no shame there.<\/p>\n<p>Before 2005, my information is a little spotty on who the Expos named.\u00a0 Here&#8217;s what I do know:<\/p>\n<p>2004: Ryan Church<br \/>\n2003: Terrmel Sledge<br \/>\n2002<br \/>\n2001<br \/>\n2000: Brad Wilkerson<br \/>\n1999:<br \/>\n1998: Michael Barrett, Noah Hall<br \/>\n1997:<br \/>\n1996: Vladimir Guerrero<br \/>\n1995: Vladimir Guerrero<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Nationals on 9\/24\/14 announced that Lucas Giolito and Steven Souza were named their minor league players of the\u00a0year for 2014 (announcement made on twitter, h\/t to FederalBaseball for the initial posting on the topic). No surprise for Souza, who sported an OPS above 1.000 in AAA.\u00a0 I was a bit surprised Giolito got the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[17,1815,2124,72,35,483,369,39,43,915,2180,2610,852,733,2613,2611,196,2614,829,142,1328,197,24,2612,34,235,1224,88],"class_list":["post-9789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-minorspitching","category-natsgeneral","tag-aj-cole","tag-austin-voth","tag-billy-burns","tag-brad-meyers","tag-brad-peacock","tag-brad-wilkerson","tag-derek-norris","tag-john-lannan","tag-jordan-zimmermann","tag-justin-maxwell","tag-kory-casto","tag-leonard-davis","tag-lucas-giolito","tag-matt-skole","tag-michael-barrett","tag-mike-oconner","tag-nathan-karns","tag-noah-hall","tag-ryan-church","tag-steve-lombardozzi","tag-steven-souza","tag-taylor-hill","tag-taylor-jordan","tag-terrmel-sledge","tag-tommy-milone","tag-tyler-moore","tag-vladimir-guerrero","tag-zech-zinicola"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9789"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9804,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9789\/revisions\/9804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}