Late last week, the invitees to the Florida Instructional League were announced, broken down by pitchers and position players.
One of our commenters (markfd) broke down the ’10 invites into three categories or buckets, if you will, and for ’11 it still holds water (dear Liza, dear Liza)…
1. Very Young
2. Changing Roles/Position
3. Guys That Need To Work On Specific Skill/Pitch
All but one of the position players moved up a level from 2010 to 2011. Russell Moldenhauer was the exception. Among the pitchers, the “spent time at multiple levels” exception still holds true (Danny Rosenbaum, Trevor Holder, Rob Wort) but with the influx of DSL talent and more importantly, the organization getting younger, there were more repeats at the short-season/rookie levels (DSL, GCL, NYPL).
Overall, there were 20 repeats from 2010 to 2011 — 12 position players, eight pitchers. Like last year, nearly all of the newbies are 2011 draftees or DSL rookies. The exceptions? Nathan Karns, Jack McGeary, Chris McKenzie, Elvin Ramirez, Cameron Selik, and Matt Swynenberg. All but the last two were injured or have missed significant time due to injury.
I think folks need to be careful reading too much into who’s not on those two lists because not being invited is not necessarily an indictment. Josh Smoker, for example, probably didn’t go back because the organization has seen enough from him in 2011 and believes he’s on track for 2012. Likewise for Roberto Perez in Auburn. And of course, there’s always the explanation of injuries, for which we have little information and the organization shares very sparingly.
Unfortunately, stories out of the FIL are few and far between. Last year, we were fortunate enough to have one of our readers issue a couple of dispatches, and of course, Bryce Harper made an appearance. Stephen Strasburg has been mentioned as possibly making some appearance for a week or two, which is probably our best hope of anything, given our budget and the biases of the traditional media outlets on which I have to rely for anything I can’t see in person.
As I did last offseason, I’ll try pass along whatever information I come across, FIL or otherwise, until the Arizona Fall League starts. In the meantime, as VladiHondo said: Let’s enjoy watching “our kids” in DC this September.