Sam Travis, 1B, Red Sox
The Red Sox were having a rather lukewarm month of May offensively and Sam Travis was definitely heating up in Pawtucket (where the calamari roams free) with 3 HRs and a .561 SLG%. Still, I am not sure why the Red Sox chose this particular moment to purchase his contract. Still, he's up and slated to hit against LHP for the time being. We've been talking a lot this spring about a raft of young hitters who show both some pop and a hit tool. Well ... Sam Travis has a hit tool.
The 23-year-old right-handed hitter is 6-2/205 and as you can see below Sam controls his strike zone, makes contact and hits for average. Save for his first jump to AAA, he's also posted better-than-average K rates even with his outlier SwStr% in high-A. He came from college (and a strong tour up here in the Cape Cod League) and brought his hit tools with him. He has been strong out of the gate but suffered a developmental delay when he tore his ACL a year ago.
Sam has bounced back well this year, and he's posted a high-minors-high .167 ISO. I bring it up because the real question is whether he has enough pop to make him viable at first base or DH, which are basically the only two options here. I have seen no evidence so far that he has position-level power.
Chances are that Sam has enough physical power to approach a representative amount of game power, but that borders on speculation and represents a ceiling. A little lift would help and Sam is advanced enough to try and incorporate some if asked to do so, but in the end, I think 20 HRs at the MLB level is a small reach, even with enough PT. And with his current power limits, Sam may not ever see every day ABs.
I wouldn't go too hard for Travis at this point. I am not sure this is a long-term call up for one thing. For another, I am not sure there's a ton of ABs to be had here either, at least while Han-Ram and Mitch Moreland are healthy. Long term Sam's lack of power potential caps his value quite a bit. If you want to invest roster space and acquisition costs into a prospect, I say find one with a higher ceiling.
Long-Term Fantasy Grade - C
Dinelson Lamet, RHP, Padres
Dinelson Lament fanned 8 Mets in 5 innings in his MLB debut on Thursday. He held the Mets to 3 hits and walked 2. The walks are important. We'll get back to that.
The 24-year-old is a 6-4/187 right-hander. The Dominican lost some early development time with documentation issues but he's been punching out hitters with regularity in the high minors since 2016. He's also walking hitters on a fairly regular basis as well. We'll get back to that.
Dinelson showed his easy velo against the Mets averaging 95.2. From there he threw a representative deployment of his FB/SL/CH package. The slider is outstanding, with good depth and it runs at -10mph from his fastball. It is a really tough change of pace with good bite.
The fact that he threw his change 16+% in his MLB debut gives you an idea of how far he's brought it in the last two years. The concern had been that he wouldn't develop the third pitch that would keep him out of the bullpen and give him a weapon against LHHs. It seems as if that change has become much more than viable as a third pitch and that makes Dinelson intriguing.
The other issue is Lamet's willingness to issue walks. That's a problem that actually expanded this year in AAA, his second year in the high minors. He has some punch out ability to compensate for it, and what has also helped this year in AAA was the rise in his GB rate. That's probably due to the development of his changeup. In the high minors, the problem has been that he gives up walks and he gives up fly balls, which sometimes result in homers. He gave one of those up in his debut Thursday and walked two batters in 5 innings. Fortunately, neither of those walks were on base when the HR was hit ... # sequencing
I like where Lement is in his development. I like how the change up is coming along and I like his velo and his ability to fan hitters. All that is left is to tame the walks and keep the ball in the park. The ballpark helps him with the latter, time will help him in the former.
I think Dinelson has the ceiling of a #3 but I think his floor is that of a solid back-half-of-the-rotation starter. Although I'd avoid his next start Tuesday against the Cubs, I think he's a good add right now and he would make a nice addition to your stable of "option" pitchers to choose from while you are streaming starts.
Long-Term Fantasy Grade - B--
Registered members can click on the following link to see the complete Prospect Central article for this week, which includes other prospects: http://www.fantistics.com/
