Man, I am active on a few boards for my teams and none are as toxic as this one. I never said anything glowing, just giving an update. He's showing some life at the plate and I hope he keeps showing improvement. The most active members on this board are nothing but negative, it's exhausting
I don't mean to be negative, just realistic. I'm not a particularly negative guy on other prospects in the system; for example, I think at least one of Rutledge or Henry likely will be a legit starter and the other a reasonable reliever. I've just seen enough of Antuna versus similarly-aged corner OF prospects in other systems (and infield prospects, back when that's what he was) to think he's not much more than a lottery ticket at this point.
One thing I particularly don't understand with him was the move to LF. When moving a guy off SS who has the athletic traits but has trouble with grounders and throwing accuracy but not strength, the usual move is CF. That describes Antuna almost perfectly. He has the tools to play CF - if not well, then at least not worse than a lot of the destined-for-the-corners dudes you see there in A+. And in CF you get a lot more work, so it's a better place to learn on the job than a corner. That's not his fault at all, but rather the team's. And frankly, a guy who was learning CF, might stick there, and is OPSing .777 at 22 in A+ is a much different prospect than a guy who's in LF with no apparent organizational appetite to even try him at 8.
And I certainly didn't mean my post as an attack on yours - which merely provided helpful information. Sorry if it came off that way.
WNFF (and Nats fans in general) are pretty oblivious to scouting and prospects. They expcet guys to race through the system and thats simply not how baseball works.
A sub .800 OPS in High A is nothing special, but its also nothing to snear at. He's behind schedule from where we hoped, but Im not sure why we'd give up on him or declare him a bust at age 22.
The thing that bothers me with him is there isn't a single major tool that is close to MLB-caliber right now, and counting his 2020 alternate site gig he's in his sixth year as a pro. There's nothing to carry him and surmount the many negative/neutrals in his profile. With a lot of fringey dudes in high-A (and this even applies to 22-year-olds), you have some profile that translates to "has a chance if he can maintain his average/power levels, cut down on Ks, and up his defensive value by showing he either can play above-average LF or average RF." With Antuna, it's "has to improve his average, has to improve his power, has to show he can play any defensive position even remotely adequately, and maintain his plate discipline and contact skills the whole way up." There are just too many things that need to go right - and given his status with the 40/options, need to go right very soon - for me to see it working out.
