Felix Pie?

[CUBS4VEDDER]

Does anyone else think that the Cubs and everyone else should quit giving this guy so much credit. I do not think he deserves to be a regular starter. he cant hit the ball and his fielding skills are shameful(I hope everyone remembers him dropping balls in the outfield this past season right when we were in the middle of the NL Central race). I say get rid of him, he shouldnt even be considered for a starting outfield position. He is fast on the bases that is his only upside. Thoughts?

[Williamsburg2599]

Does anyone else think that the Cubs and everyone else should quit giving this guy so much credit. I do not think he deserves to be a regular starter. he cant hit the ball and his fielding skills are shameful(I hope everyone remembers him dropping balls in the outfield this past season right when we were in the middle of the NL Central race). I say get rid of him, he shouldnt even be considered for a starting outfield position. He is fast on the bases that is his only upside. Thoughts?

Don't watch the Cubs, but Baseball-Reference.com has him with 0 errors.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/p/piefe01.shtml

[CUBS4VEDDER]

The instances I am thinking of would not exactly count as errors but they count as those "What are you doing Pie, you idiot" moments. I am acctually suprised he has no errors, acctually it has to be a mistake I have seen him make errors.

[Bob Sacamento]

Does anyone else think that the Cubs and everyone else should quit giving this guy so much credit. I do not think he deserves to be a regular starter. he cant hit the ball and his fielding skills are shameful(I hope everyone remembers him dropping balls in the outfield this past season right when we were in the middle of the NL Central race). I say get rid of him, he shouldnt even be considered for a starting outfield position. He is fast on the bases that is his only upside. Thoughts?

Pie deserves to start, he has nothing left to prove in AAA. Sure he struggled in his first short stint with the club but that's to be expected out of a 22 year old with no MLB experience. As for his fielding being shameful, how much have you watched of this kid? Obviously not enough. Pie is an excellent defender, he covers large amounts of ground with his speed and additional plus arm. In fact, when Pie was struggling with his bat early in the year, he was saving vast amounts of extrabases to his left and right with our below average defensive corner outfielders.

[Scartissue]

Baseball Prospectus says he fielded 2 runs above the average CF (that's with limited playing time), and also projects that he'll be an above average fielder. A below average fielder will have negative fielding runs above average.

I haven't been following the minor leagues until the last couple of years, but it seems to me good defense is more projectible than good offense. Sometimes with infielders, they learn to be better fielders. Pujols is a good example of a player that learned to play very good defense over time. I suspect, however, it's harder to improve defense at the CF position relative to the infield without the raw tools. You can't teach speed or arm strength, which are important to a CF. Speed can only be compensated by another hard to teach ability--reading balls off the bat and taking good routes. Outfielders rarely make errors relative to infielders, but a great outfielder's value is to get to balls that others don't get to. Errors/sure-handedness are a bad way to judge any fielder standing alone, but probably especially bad for outfielders.

I don't know if he'll eventually learn to hit MLB pitchers, but I'm much more comfortable predicting that he will be an above average fielder. In any event, he's the type of prospect that you give the benefit of the doubt to.

[nathanKent]

I'm less concerned with his struggles at the major league level last season and far more concerned with his seeming inability to hit right now in winter ball.

[Bob Sacamento]

I'm less concerned with his struggles at the major league level last season and far more concerned with his seeming inability to hit right now in winter ball.

I've watched him the last four years now at Licey, he never hits there. This is the most he's every played thus far but I wouldn't read too much into the winter numbers especially as his whole team can't hit.