False Start to the Youth Movement (Nationwide)

It really did seem like the tide was turning and the youth movements across Major League Baseball were becoming more the norm than a sign of teams being fiscally uptight. And, across baseball you see more teams littered with prospects and highly-touted young talents. But so far in 2008, it has been an extremely tough year for some of the game’s most talented youngsters. I usually focus on New York’s version, Hughes and Kennedy, but across the board there are bigtime young talents either floundering, injured, or both.

The big one that broke today is Yovani Gallardo, extremely dynamic starter for the Milwaukee Brewers. He missed the first 3 weeks of the season recovering from arthroscopic knee surgery, and now it sounds as if he’ll miss the rest of the year recovering from a torn ACL. He’s already struck out 114 hitters in only 130 career innings, and he seemed like the sure-fire future ace in the Brewers’ rotation. Now, with his second knee problem this year, he’s looking like a sure-fire heir to the Ben Sheets throne of extremely talented yet too-often injured Milwaukee starter.

The next big name is Colorado’s Troy Tulowitzki. His problems start with his performance through the season’s first month, when he hit to a meager .152 AVG/.226 OBP/.238 SLG clip and was looking like the leading candidate for the Sophomore Slump Award. That was bad enough, but then the news broke that he tore a tendon in his left quadriceps (the favorite body part for injury for infielders so far this year) and is expected to be out until the All-Star Break (also known as, July).

Going back to the NL Central, early in the season it appeared that the Reds had found an immediate top of the rotation starter in Johnny Cueto. He started out unbelievably for a 21 year old, as through his first 4 starts his numbers were 26.1 IP 1-1 W/L 16 H 10 ER 3 BB/29 K 1.37 WHIP 3.42 ERA, an impressive line on a not-so-great team. His last two starts, however, have been one bad, one absolutely atrocious. On Apr. 29 against St. Louis he only lasted 1.2 innings, gave up 8 hits and 6 earned runs and saw his overall ERA balloon to 5.40. The shine has come off a bit, and now Dusty Baker is giving him a few extra days before his next start “to get his mind right”. The Reds have found quality out of their crop of highly-talented youngsters, though, as Joey Votto and Edinson Volquez have both performed extremely well in the early going.

Sticking in the same division, Houston has seen two of its young offensive prospects perform up to the standards of mediocrity so far this year. Hunter Pence, the unorthodox outfielder, has gotten off to a slow start, hitting a modest .250 but only producing 1 longball and 10 RBIs. He’s got a terrible K/BB ration of 23/5, something that makes his lack of productivity even more damning. Backstop of the future J.R. Towles has battled injuries since Spring Training, but is jumping back and forth between the interstate to start the year, consistently coming in in the .190-.200 range with his early-season average. Granted, he has connected for 4 home runs, and has been more patient than Pence, but his numbers are not where people expected them to be so far in 2008.

Going over to the NL East, offseason pickup and potential ace of the future for the Florida Marlins Andrew Miller has been an unequivocal letdown so far. He’s given up a disgusting 48 hits in 25.2 innings so far, and this is in the National League of all places. His ERA is an unsightly 9.12, outdoing even Phil Hughes for the lead in the putrid pitching category. The NL has hit a whopping .417 against Miller, not pretty considering the lineups are supposed to be thinner (I mean, the pitcher gets to hit) than the AL.

The AL Central features some disappointments, and we’ll start with some unfulfilling Minnesota Twinkies. Specifically a couple of guys they picked up in high-profile offseason moves. Delmon Young has yet to tally a home run and has only driven in 8 runs so far, a far cry from the productive bat the Twins were looking for when they dealt Matt Garza and Jason Bartlett for his services. He has managed to swipe 6 bags and score 13 runs, but his production can’t afford to lag this badly considering how little else he does offensively (meaning, no walks, no extra base hits right now). Likewise, Carlos Gomez, the main position player in the Santana deal, has looked pretty unimpressive with the stick. He can flat-out run, as seen through his 11 steals in 12 tries, but he also can flat-out not take walks: 2 walks to 25 Ks, not exactly what you want from a speedster meant to hit at the top of a lineup.

As shown through their flogging of the Yankees, the Tigers appear to be turning things around lately. One guy, however, who still has yet to head in the right direction has been their young flamethrower Justin Verlander. He’s currently 1-4 with a 6.50 ERA, and he’s been lit up even recently, while the Tigers have pulled themselves to .500 as a team. He has more walks (17) than strikeouts (14) on the year, a terrible sign for a power pitcher like him. The fact that he’s got a track record and calls a notorious pitcher’s park home leads one to believe he will figure things out, but red flags early, nonetheless.

The Royals have been a surprising team, but a past #1 draft pick of theirs has performed surprisingly poorly in their rotation thus far. Luke Hochevar has not channeled the success of Zack Greinke, who appears to be emerging as K.C.’s ace, as in his 2 starts with Missouri’s Big Blue he has an ugly 5.91 ERA, allowing 7 runs in 10+ innings of work. He’s struggled throughout his early career in both the minors and majors, but the chance of him turning it on this season as things start to go the Royals’ way seems unlikely at this point.

That’s all I can think of for now, though I’m sure I’ve overlooked some. One I know I could have mentioned was Jarrod Saltamalacchia, who didn’t break camp with the Rangers, but is now back and splitting time with Gerald Laird behind the plate. He qualifies as an N/A, since it’s not clear if he’s been a disappointment in the majors yet this year.