With the second selection in the Rule 5 today, the Pirates selected Marlins outfielder John Raynor.

As a Rule 5 selection, Raynor will have to make the club out of Spring Training or be offered back to the Marlins. Still, Neal Huntington says he’ll have to compete for a spot.

Raynor is an incredibly toolsy outfielder. He’s lightning fast, running a 6.3 60-yard dash. That makes him the fastest straight-line runner in the Pirates organization, though Andrew McCutchen is probably better at pure baserunning. He knows how to use it, too, stealing double-digit bases every year in the minors with very few caught stealing. Scouts rave about his defense, and he can certainly cover a lot of ground. He does have a bit of a weak arm, however.

He also has a little bit of pop, slugging .452 in his minor league career.

All that said, if he wasn’t good enough to make the Marlins’ 40-man roster, there has to be a downside. He had a down year in 2009, his first year in AAA, hitting .257/.327/.360. However, he did heat up as the season went on, putting up a .306/.388/.459 line in August. It’s possible that he just didn’t adjust to AAA pitching until late in the season. He also has a strikeout problem, which could denote contact issues. He strikes out in about 22% of his plate appearances.

He does have some prospect pedigree, with John Sickels rating him as the 10th-best player in the Marlins organization to start 2009. After his slow season, however, Sickels said that rating was too high.

Raynor will probably be able to contribute right away as a fourth outfielder, and is most likely an upgrade over Brandon Moss in that regard. That doesn’t sound like much, but when you consider that the Rule 5 draft is basically the table scraps of other teams, it’s a nice pickup.

A few people around the Pirates blogosphere are putting a Nyjer Morgan comparison on Raynor. I’m not ready to say that, but it’s something to keep in mind.

Raynor actually gives the Pirates a little flexibility in how they want to use him.

First, unlike Moss, Raynor can be a backup at every outfield position. While Lastings Milledge can play center if Andrew McCutchen needs a day of rest, Raynor is probably a better option defensively.

Second, Raynor can contribute immediately as a platoon player. When talking about him, Huntington mentioned that he can “go and hit against left-handed pitching.” That’s good news, because assuming Jeff Clement plays well enough to push Garrett Jones to right field full-time, he’ll need a platoon partner. Jones struggles mightily against lefties, with a .198/.225/.421 line against them. Meanwhile, Raynor’s minor league splits back up Huntington’s statement: he has a career .327/.392/.475 line against southpaws.

Finally, Raynor’s speed makes him an awesome pinch runner. This is obviously not his most important role, but every little bit counts.

At any rate, I hope Raynor plays well enough out of Spring Training to make the roster. I’m excited to see what he can do off the bench.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 10th, 2009 at 8:13 pm and is filed under News Headlines. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.