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| Luis "Quick Hands" Guillorme |
The slick fielding shortstop won the SAL MVP award in 2015 and keeps
turning heads with his defense
2015 with Savannah (included playoffs): 125 G, 535 PA, .319/.392/.354, 68 R, 16 2B, 55 RBI, 71 K: 55 BB (13.3 K%: 10.3 BB%) – 9.5% swinging strikeout rate, 13 GIDP, 17 SH, .374 BABIP, .035 ISO, 120 wRC+ (127 pwRC+), 18-26 on stolen bases, 28.6 AB/XBH, 69.7 GB%: 10.7 FB%: 18.1 LD%: 1.5 PU%
If
your new to this site or Mets prospects, I introduced Luis Guillorme a little
in my Mets
in the WBCQ post, but since he’s among the top-25 prospects in the system,
and one I’ve seen live and on MiLB.tv, I wanted to write a longer post. The
Mets went over-slot to sign shortstop Guillorme out of Coral Springs High
School in Florida during the 10th round of the 2013 draft because
his defense was good enough to earn him a Omar Viszquel draft day comparison.
Comparing a high school kid who was drafted in the 10th round to a
potential Hall Of Famer is usually a massive exaggeration, but Guillorme has
proven to be one of the top defensive shortstops in the minors, so maybe not so
massive in this case. Vizquel is the best-case outcome for all defense-first,
light-hitting shortstops, so it’s an unfair comp to just throw out there, but
Guillorme has shown some similar traits offensively too. Vizquel posted a 147
K: 136 BB ratio (12.8 K%: 11.8 BB%) over his first 284 minor league games (3
seasons and change), and went on to post a 1,087 K: 1,028 BB ratio over nearly
3,000 career major league games, so he was well above league average at drawing
walks and not striking out during his career. Guillorme’s 115 K: 89 BB ratio
(11.7 K%: 9.1 BB%) in his first 3 seasons (223 games) is near that level, and
he’s hit for a better average so far than Vizquel ever did in the minors, but
‘Little O’ had 55 XBH during his first 3 plus seasons (36 2B, 10 3B, 9 HR),
while ‘Little Luis’ has only the 30 doubles to date. Digging a little deeper,
Vizquel only had a dozen sac bunts in his first 3 minor league seasons, but
he’d end up with 256 in his major league career, and was often at or near the
top of the sac bunt leader board. Guillorme has 27 sac bunts to date, and the
bunt was a regular part of his game in 2015, when he finished with 16 sacs and
often tried to bunt his way on. Vizquel was rated faster and stole 50 bases in
his first 3 minor league seasons, and then 404 in his major league career,
which Guillorme won’t match. But he does have 30 stolen bases to date, and could
be capable of picking his spots for some low but efficient totals in the
majors.
The
Vizquel comparison above was meant to show that there is a valuable starting outcome
possible from the defense-first, light-hitting shortstop model, and that
Guillorme is filling in many areas of the mold Vizquel set, which may be
intentional. That said, many scouts and prospect outlets don’t think he’ll hit
enough to hold down a starters job at the major leagues. He has 20-power and below
average home-to-first times, so his offensive game is limited, but he has
good bat control, which should help him maintain a high contact rate as he
moves up. Baseball America describes his plan at the plate perfectly in their 2016 Prospect Guidebook, saying that he
has, “a flat-plane, inside-out swing he uses to repeatedly serve the ball to left
field.” You can see what they mean in his spray charts and many of the GIF’s
below, as Luis slapped single after single over the shortstops head last year. Below
I look at a few trends from his 2015 to keep an eye on as he advances to the
FSL this year.
As a quick side note, BA has him as
a high risk, 50 future value prospect ranked #12 in the system, that BP report
has him as a high risk, 30 future value prospect ranked #20
in Jeff’s list, and Fangraphs put him in the 45+
category at #9, with Farnsworth labeling him a 35/45/55 future value
prospect. Borrowing a line I saw
during the Mike Newman tirade, Fangraphs is saying he’ll either be a future
AAAA player, a future fringe starter, or a future good starter – gee, thanks,
that helps clear things up.
Table 1 – Luis Guillorme Splits by Month
Month
|
PA
|
AB/XBH
|
BB%
|
K%
|
BABIP
|
ISO
|
wRC+
|
GB%
|
April
|
81
|
66
|
16
|
13.6
|
.382
|
.015
|
137
|
72.7
|
May
|
109
|
0 XBH
|
3.7
|
11
|
.341
|
0
|
86
|
68.9
|
June
|
105
|
21.8
|
14.3
|
18.1
|
.353
|
.046
|
114
|
69.7
|
July
|
114
|
49
|
9.6
|
15.8
|
.333
|
.020
|
91
|
71.1
|
August
|
98
|
11.6
|
8.2
|
10.2
|
.452
|
.087
|
175
|
64.5
|
September
|
29
|
12
|
13.8
|
3.4
|
.435
|
.083
|
196
|
78.3
|
Table 2 – Luis Guillorme Splits by Pitcher Handedness
Throws
|
PA
|
AB/XBH
|
BB%
|
K%
|
BABIP
|
ISO
|
wRC+
|
GB%
|
LHP
|
169
|
20.3
|
11.2
|
14.2
|
.364
|
.049
|
122
|
71.2
|
RHP
|
367
|
35.1
|
9.8
|
12.8
|
.377
|
.028
|
122
|
69.1
|
Guillorme
hit only 1 double over his first 234 PA (51 G), but hit 2 on June 10th,
and 13 over the next 70 games, including 9 over the final 24 games of the
season. That might not move the needle much on Guillorme’s future offensive
value, but that’s a big jump in production for him. In that last month he
nearly matched his 2014 total of 10 doubles in 57 games with Kingsport. He had
an 0-10 with 6 K’s over 2 games in mid-June, but then finished the season with more
walks than strikeouts (32 to 31) over 261 PA. If you’re looking for reasons to
be optimistic about his offense, you can find some. BABIP is going to be an
important part of his offensive game, so he could see year-to-year fluctuations
in offensive production, but his defensive value should be reliable. His
approach shouldn’t lead to any big platoon splits, which can only help.
Table 3 – Luis Guillorme Splits by Batted Ball Type
Batted Ball Type*
|
PA
|
BABIP
|
SAL BABIP
|
wOBA
|
SAL wOBA
|
Fly balls
|
42
|
.238
|
.189
|
.245
|
.341
|
Groundballs
|
288
|
.317
|
.252
|
.297
|
.243
|
Line Drives
|
71
|
.704
|
.734
|
.711
|
.788
|
Table 4 – Luis Guillorme Splits by Batted Ball Direction
Batted Ball
Direction
|
PA
|
%
|
AB/XBH
|
BABIP
|
SAL BABIP*
|
wOBA
|
SAL wOBA*
|
GB%
|
Center
|
95
|
23.2
|
30.3
|
.430
|
.370
|
.411
|
.392
|
73.4
|
Opposite
|
174
|
42.4
|
14
|
.424
|
.320
|
.417
|
.334
|
50
|
Pull
|
141
|
34.4
|
130
|
.292
|
.302
|
.275
|
.372
|
91.2
|
*LHB only
He
rarely hits the ball in the air, but when he does, it’s usually to LF, and he
hits a lot of singles and most of his doubles the other way. Bunts are included
in the groundball designation, so a lot of those pulled groundballs are drag
bunts, but that’s still such an extreme groundball rate to the pull side. I
think his game would look a lot better if he could start pulling line drives
over the first and second baseman’s head with consistency, but that’s easier
said than done, and may not be part of his plan. The same concerns about high
BABIP on groundballs from a fringe-speed guy that
I voiced over T.J. Rivera apply here, but Guillorme’s high bunt-rate would
give his BABIP on groundballs an artificial boost – when he bunts for a hit
with a runner on, unless he fails to advance the runner, the worst-case outcome
is a sac bunt, which counts against nothing in his stat line.
Guillorme’s
defense is a blast to watch, as you can see here,
in several GIF’s of him in the field below, and on several of the YouTube
video’s I’ve linked to at the very bottom of this page. He doesn’t have the
best shortstop arm in the minors, although it’s still plenty good for
shortstop. He might not have the best shortstop range in the minors, but it is
above average – Jeff P’s line in the BP report above is, “will get to more
throws then he can make.” So what makes Luis Guillorme stand out? It’s his
lightning quick hands and reactions, great instincts, smooth actions, excellent
footwork, and overall on-field leadership, in approximately that order – in
short, basically everything. His hands are so fast that it’s almost as if, from
the time he fields the ball, to the time the ball leaves for 1B or 2B, the ball
never stops moving, and is actually sped up. I know that’s the goal of those quick
throw drills that every player does growing up, but Luis’s quick hands would
make Old West Gunslinger’s jealous – I bet “The Kid” wished he had
hands as quick as Luis. Look at these defensive plays from 4/25, 5/6, and 5/22
below to get an idea of his instincts and quick reactions.
In
the first play, Guillorme has to hold the bag while diving for the ball as
someone is diving at him into the bag. In the second, he has a bat coming at him and
has to get his throw to 1B quickly, so he barehands it – talk about Omar
Vizquel comp. In the third, the catcher’s throw is going to sail into CF if he
doesn’t jump over the runner to catch it, and he still gets the tag down. You
can’t practice for these plays, you can only hope to react in a safe and
positive way to these plays, and he consistently does.
Major
league shortstops have averaged about an 85 wRC+ over the past 5 seasons, so
the bar is not very high at the position. Even with a 72 wRC+ in 2014,
Andrelton Simmons was worth 2 fWAR, of course he led all shortstops in
Fangraphs defensive value, UZR/150, and DRS that year, so Guillorme would have
to prove to be one of the best defensive shortstops in the majors to make up
for such offensive production. To finish the comparison, Simmons has a better
arm and more power than Guillorme, but Guillorme has shown a better ability to
draw walks (albeit against low minors pitching), which would cut the offensive gap.
Moving
forward, Guillorme is going to have to prove doubters wrong about his offense
at each level, but his defense will keep him getting plenty of opportunities to
do so. He’s never going to be considered a power hitter, but if he can keep
slapping doubles at the same rate as he did down the stretch in 2015, his ISO
will be enough that he’ll have fewer doubters. His good bat control and
opposite field approach have allowed him to be a high average/low strikeout
hitter to this point, but I think he’ll need to start using the whole field
more as he advances, specifically RF. There’s enough defense and OBP in his
game that I lean towards the starters upside BA/FG place on him, with an
understanding that if he can’t maintain that high OBP (he’ll need a .300+
BABIP), he’d be used as the emergency shortstop in AAA – for an NL squad. In
the AL, there’s more room to carry a defense-first infielder if they’re good
enough, and his table-setting style could be great in the 9-hole of an AL
lineup. He'll be spending the year in the FSL, so it'll be hard to get any footage of him, but I hope to see a few St. Lucie games this year, and hopefully his father can make another video like this one.
2015 Astromets Mind GIF Coverage
YouTube video from posted by his proud father
It's National Astronomy day in Chile! #ChileMiraTuCielo https://t.co/miOQkzPLgO pic.twitter.com/xpF3XWUczW— Carnegie Astronomy (@CarnegieAstro) March 18, 2016
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