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Cubs’ Sold on Vitters as 2007 Draft Pick

April 30th, 2007

The Draft is approaching shortly (June 7-8th) but it’s becoming very evident the Cubs have their eyes set on one individual with their 3rd overall pick in the upcoming draft. Tampa is a lock to draft lefty Vanderbilt starter David Price, while the Royals are wrestling between Georgia Tech’s catcher Matt Weiters, North Carolina State’s Andrew Brackman, and New Jersey high school righty Rick Porcello. My money, just like it was last year is that the Royals go for Weiters. And last year I would have said that Brackman would likely be the Cubs pick. Yet Andrew has looked very raw this year and will take awhile to develop. Now it’s looking very likely that the Cubs will pick the purest hitter in the draft with the highest potential, Josh Vitters.

Here’s a breakdown on Vitters:

Josh Vitters
6′4
205 lbs
R/R

Vitters’ is the top high school hitter in the draft and one of the top three overall hitters. He’s a big boy already, yet he projects to only grow bigger along with adding more muscle to his frame. With his amazing bat speed and quick wrists he’s able to hit balls to all fields effortlessly. His natural stroke gives him built-in power that will only increase while having the ability to be a run producer. No question, he has the potential be a .300 hitter with 30-40 homerun power. He has decent at best speed, but is a smart baserunner. Offensively he is very gifted but defensively, he has a very questionable glove and limited range at 3B. The bigger Josh gets the less likely it’s going to be that he can stay at an important defensive position such as 3B. Vitters been part of a longrunning legacy at Cypress HS, where he was shortstop for a duration, following his brother [Christian] who was drafted by the A’s last year and is now in Low A Kane County. Before Christian, the SS for Cypress was current Cub prospect Scott Moore. Josh Vitters has a strong arm, and currently for Cypress HS in Anahiem, CA he’s playing 3B, his increased size has rendered him not as defensively able as prior at SS. He’s not likely to continue as an infielder as he develops, the most likely spot for him is as a corner, with his power potential and bat skills it should allow for the transition. Last year as a Junior he hit .352 (31/88) with 7 2B, 9 HR, 32 RBI with 7/7 SB. He was selected to many scouting industries’ All-High School first team. He’s continuing that pace again this year. Currently he’s committed to Arizona State for the 2008 season but that likely won’t hold. Look for the Cubs to be able to sign him quickly.

Posted by Bob Sacamento in Old Archive

This entry was posted on Monday, April 30th, 2007 at 5:15 am and is filed under Old Archive. You can follow any responses to this entry through the comments RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

4 Responses to “Cubs’ Sold on Vitters as 2007 Draft Pick”

StylesClash says:

Drafting another High School positional player with a first round pick worries me. Corey Patterson, Luis Montanez and Ryan Harvey have all shown the Cubs have had a very poor eye towards High School talent in the past.

Now Tim Wilken does have a track record of successfully drafting in this area with players such as Vernon Wells and Shawn Green. So I will give him the benefit of the doubt if he chooses this path again.

But Vitters’ lack of plate discipline makes me fear he is Ryan Harvey part two.

As far as I’m concerned we should hope David Price sets his asking price for a contract high enough to the point where he slides down to pick three, which allowed Andrew Miller (the best talent in last years draft) to fall down to pick six. Price is easily the surest bet to succeed in the 2007 draft.

April 30th, 2007 at 2:46 pm
Austin Wilcox says:

So far I like what Wilken has shown us and that is his ability to diversify his portfolio. Last year he paired a college hitter (usually lower upside but less risky) with a more risky phenom with upside (Samardzjia).

I hope he takes this same approach by taking a high upside, high risk young talent and then take the less risk, less return investements in the 2nd and 3rd rounds.

Historically speaking, college hitters and pitchers are less risky of an investment but they also offer the least amount of upside i.e. there is not much variance in there performance. Whereas high school players (especially pitchers) have a ton of variance or more of a “boom or bust” quality to them.

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Contact Austin, Cubshub.com Sabermetrician and Baseball Enthusiast, at austin-wilcox@uiowa.edu

April 30th, 2007 at 6:45 pm
Bob Sacamento says:

I don’t think it’s proper to compare Vitters to Harvey, a better comparision to Harvey is Michael Burgess. Vitters does need to work on his plate discipline, without question, as he’s an aggressive hitter at the plate, looking for a hit first. If we wind up with Vitters, I’m going on faith of Wilken, the man does have a solid pedigree in drafts that he has a hand in.

Concerning David Price, he is the “surest” thing to come out of college since Mark Prior. I know as Cub fans we see that as a negative. But one can never predict injury in a pitcher, even with pristine mechanics. I don’t think there is a salary demand/request on Price’s part that prevents the Devil Rays from drafting him. Pitching is Tampa’s weakest point, and Price is the most advanced pitching prospect.

April 30th, 2007 at 11:21 pm
Bob Sacamento says:

Not only did Wilken go with a high risk-high reward guy in Samardzija in the 5th round, but we also took (and signed) highly regarded Chris Huseby (11th Rd) and Andrew Rundle (14th) whom were considered unsignable. Wilken also took some solid talent later in Palpebon (19th Rd), Matulia (24th Rd) plus the draft darling of 2B/3B Ryan Malone (49th Rd) who posted a very suprising 2006 season in Peoria (Low A) .284/.385/.426/.811.

Even if we do take the high schooler Vitters at #3, we do also have a supplemental pick at #48 for losing Juan Pierre. So we could take a player falling for contract reasons or a safe pick, as this draft is pretty deep. Of course we lost our second rounder for bringing Soriano under the fold. Other than that we have the rest of our picks. I think Wilken rolled the dice in last year’s draft. Colvin was a safe pick, sure he wasn’t likely a first rounder but he was supplemental/2nd Rd worthy, and we didn’t have another pick until the 5th. Samardzija was an incredible pick in the 5th Rd, as he was considered a top 10 talent but unsignable due to football. In fact, I had a couple of NFL friends wondering why someone didn’t take a flyer on him over this past weekends’ draft.

Very nice point, college players are more likely to make the MLB but they are also less likely to be high impact players.

May 2nd, 2007 at 2:25 am