It Ain’t Easy Being (Grant) Green

Over at the Fansided headquarters for everything Minor Leagues Seedlings to Stars they have begun revealing their top 115 prospects in all of baseball for 2013 (115 because they couldn’t settle on just 100).  Despite the recent trade of A.J. Cole, the Oakland Athletics Minor League system is chock full of young talent that are certain to make appearances on this list.  So I thought it would be a good opportunity to expand on the short profiles given to each player as they are revealed.

One day Grant Green will finally get to play in front of Section 149. (Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports)

The first member of the Athletics organization to show up on this list is shortstop/everything else Grant Green.  The first round pick from 2009 out of USC has had quite an interesting ride thus far in his career.  He appears on this list at number 110, which is not a disappointment because at this juncture the simple fact that he still appears on a prospect list like this is a good thing.  Be it his lack of defensive prowess, or the Athletics lack of decisiveness with him, but he’s bounced all around the diamond, moving from short to second to third to the outfield and back around again.  It’s not much of a shock he’s been inconsistent throughout his career considering his nomadic nature in the field.

Green has finally become well established at the Triple A level, just one quick phone call away from Oakland.  He performed well in 2012 at that level, and seemed primed for a call up at some point in the latter stages of the season.  In 562 PA Green hit .296/.338/.458 for the Rivercats, his 102 wRC+ isn’t spectacular, but he isn’t going to generate a lot of power that will drive that number up.  The most noteworthy number though is his strikeout % which went from hovering at or above 20% for his career to just 13.3%.

When 2013 rolls around there really is no reason not to make him part of the Athletics roster, save for the fact that you can only have 25 players on the roster.  He probably won’t develop into the impact bat the A’s hoped they had acquired when drafting him in 2009, but there’s no doubt about it he can be a useful piece in the puzzle to make another AL West championship run.  At 25 years old right now, Green is teetering on the brink of no longer being a prospect and simply being a Minor Leaguer.  The A’s should take their first chance to see what they truly have with him, there’s no reason not to.  I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, free Grant Green.