April 1, 2008

Courtesy of The Cincinnati Enquirer

Mention the Reds' farm system to general manager Wayne Krivsky, and you're likely to get this response:

It's better. It's deeper. But you could always use more.

Depth is the key to a good farm system. You simply stock as many good players as you can and then sort them out later. Players often are drafted or signed in their teens. Teams try to project what they'll be four, five, six years down the line.

"Every organization has different philosophies," said Reds player development director Terry Reynolds. "You try to pick out who you think has the highest ceiling based on the tools. When you try to draft for need, you get in trouble."

Projecting what a player will be is tricky.

"Albert Pujols was a 13th-round pick," Reynolds said. "When (the Cardinals) scouted him, he was a big-bodied guy with one tool -- power. All of a sudden, you get him and you're like, 'Oh, my God.' Talk about lucking into a guy."

In the Reds' case, look at third base: The current big-league third baseman, Edwin Encarnacion, is 25, probably entering the peak years of his career. But that hasn't stopped the Reds from stockpiling at the position.

Four players rated among the Reds' top 30 prospects by Baseball America either play third or could end up there: No. 8 Todd Frazier, No. 9 Juan Francisco, No. 22 Adam Rosales and No. 23 Brandon Waring. Francisco and Waring currently are playing third. Frazier and Rosales are shortstops who could end up at third. For an in-depth look at each player with commentary from Reynolds, click here.

Frazier was a supplemental first-round draft pick last year, a result of losing free agent Rich Aurilia to the Giants. He had been an All-American at Rutgers and was a polished player when the Reds signed him. Francisco, 20, signed as a 17-year-old. He spent almost two years at the Reds' academy in the Dominican Republic before moving up to the Gulf Coast League.

"The hardest part of that is to evaluate when that young guy is ready to make that next step," Reynolds said. "You don't want to kill their confidence by pushing them too soon. But you also want to challenge them."

It looks like after years of trying, the Reds have the type of young starting pitching to sustain the franchise.

Johnny Cueto and Edinson Volquez have been the sensations of camp. Homer Bailey, last year's big story of the spring, showed a live arm, but will start the season at Triple-A Louisville.

There are a lot of reasons the Reds have seven straight losing seasons, but the biggest is the inability to develop starting pitching.

"Starting pitching is probably the hardest thing to develop," Reynolds said. "Not so much how we develop them - because we do it very similarly to how we do it with the position guys - it's just attrition. For every 10 you get, I'm guessing half those guys have a setback. Not necessarily a surgery but an arm issue of some kind, something unforeseen."

The Reds drafted starting pitchers in the first round in 1999 (Ty Howington), 2001 (Jeremy Sowers) and 2002 (Chris Gruler).

Howington never made it above Double-A. Elbow and shoulder problems ended his career before he reached his 25th birthday. Gruler, the third pick overall, had shoulder trouble and never made it out of Single-A. Sowers, now with Cleveland, never signed with the Reds.

And until 2003 or so, the Reds had no presence in Latin America, fertile ground for finding pitching. That has changed thanks in part to Reynolds' efforts.

Three months before the Reds took Bailey in the first round of the 2004 draft and signed him for $1.5 million, they signed Cueto for $3,500 after a tryout camp in the Dominican Republic.

Cueto's ahead of Bailey now. Volquez came to the Reds via Texas in the Josh Hamilton trade. At 24, he's the same age Aaron Harang was when the Reds acquired him from Oakland.