Saturday, June 2, 2012

Scouting Report on Chris Lofton

Chris Lofton was a 9th round pick by the San Francisco Giants. He is currently playing for the San Jose Giants, and that is where I watched him play on May 31st 2012.

Defensively, he wasn't tested hard, but he made all the routine plays and showed off some pretty good range in center field (range factor suggests that he has under average range). His arm seems pretty accurate, even on the run, but it is a pretty weak arm. On the bases, a botched pickoff move gave him two extra bases. He probably wasn't running his hardest but I thought he showed above average speed (Baseball Cube suggests that speed is his best attribute, rating it at 79 out of 100).

Offensively, he showed his above average patience (69 according the Baseball Cube) when he got ahead 2-0, faked a bunt to get 3-0, then took low and away to walk. As a left handed hitter (right handed thrower), he was mainly pitched away it seemed. In his next at-bat, he took an outside fastball for ball before hitting a hard liner to 2nd for an out. Next time at the plate, he took a low pitch and then hit a high pitch hard to first for a ground-ball out. He got ahead in his next at-bat 1-0 again, before faking another bunt to make it 1-1. He then swung and missed at the best pitch he saw in the whole at-bat, but worked an 8 pitch walk with some good takes and fouls. So what I saw was a decent but not great contact hitter with a good eye with not much power but some bad luck.
Statistically, Lofton has not had a good professional career. Despite a .319 career BABIP and walk rate just short of 10%, he has a .642 career OPS. He doesn't seem to have any power to speak of, and his "speed scores" are extremely disappointing.

He is extremely unpolished, and the ceiling certainly is really high, but there is some talent there obviously.

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