Gregor Chisholm had a chance to sit down with Blue Jays assistant GM Tony LaCava and discussed some of the prospects making their way through the system, definitely worth a read.
Here are a few interesting quotes:
On centre fielder Anthony Gose:
“Last year was a year where we gave him some swing changes and we felt like wanted him to focus on the swing changes, not worry about the strikeouts, not worrying about bunting. We just turned him loose and let him go out there and get as many plate appearances as we could and just worry about hitting and getting his swing down. This year, the approach is to finish him off before he goes onto the big leagues at some point, we need to finish him off and that would be through a two-strike approach. If he puts some of those balls in play that were strikeouts then I think the numbers are really going to show and we’re also going to reintroduce bunting. That’s something he’s always been able to do since he was an amateur but we’re going to bring bunting back and we think that will also help as he gets closer to the big leagues.”
“We thought he was more than just a slap hitter. We thought that there was some power there and the ability to drive the ball and that’s why we made those swing changes. He worked his butt off to make them stick and hold and now we think he has a repeatable swing that allows him to get the most out of his ability, which at times is some power. I certainly wouldn’t classify him as a power hitter but he does have some power, he has power at times, but he’s definitely more than just a singles hitter. That’s what we’re seeing now.”
On the scouting opinions of Tyler Beede and Daniel Norris:
“Our scouts really like Norris, they really liked Beede, it’s hard to say. Norris is a guy that half our guys liked Norris better than Beede. Half our guys liked Beede. We were able to draft both and unfortunately we weren’t able to sign Beede but we’re glad to have the left hander.”
“He’s a gifted left-hander with a very good arm. He has an above-average fastball and he’ll show you an above-average breaking ball. We think he has the athleticism and we think he has a chance to be a quality Major League starter.”
Pretty incredible that Anthony Gose still found so much success at the plate given the Jays took away one of his best weapons as they did not want him to bunt all season.
