re: who will be our starting shortstop this year?

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Cade Doughty was a little up an down in the fall with his glove. Mathis on the other hand looked pretty darn good. You can expect Mathis at 3rd this year with Cade fighting a bunch of other players for 2nd.

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Now that you mention it, I think I remember reading that Cade Doughty had a solid bat, but needed work on the fielding. Mathis is a new name to me... looks like quality JUCO transfer.

Whats the word on Dugas? I remember him getting hot at the plate last year and played some 2nd and 3rd

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The best scenario is that we won't need Hughes's bat and he will be at SS. His glove is golden. It's just a shame is bat is made of water!

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That's the eternal question, isn't it? How long does it take to gather enough information to let you know whether or not switching shortstops nets you more runs than you give up? There's a limited amount of time to gather that data from live games and choices have to be made with incomplete information. It's REALLY hard to pull what you know is your best glove at that position, in particular, and trade it for the hope of more offensive production. Way harder than flipping out 1B for an extra single or two a game.

That's one of many reasons I don't envy the skipper.

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Right. Garza, Beloso, Willis, Cabrera, Travinksi and Hampton all scream SS.

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He recruits CF, SS, C and moves them around.

Catchers usually between C, 1B, 3B, DH

Shortstops pretty much anywhere other than catcher

CF anywhere in the outfield.

And by that I mean that's where they played in high school not where they should be playing now. Typically the positions you see the best athletes at in high school.

I'm going to assume that usually the most talented HS players on a team play one of those three positions. I do agree that Maineri tends to recruit defense over offense but I believe Cain has been bringing in some power bats.

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He recruits CF, SS, C and moves them around

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Probably 90% of your position player recruits play those positions in high school. Those are spots for the best players on a baseball diamond, and every college baseball player is your best player on a high school field. Half of our position players on the roster won't sniff SS or CF at LSU.

Same can be said for moving from college ball to the MLB. Some of our biggest studs have played SS at LSU and moved to other positions in the MLB.

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And by that I mean that's where they played in high school not where they should be playing now. Typically the positions you see the best athletes at in high school.

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And people who think this is something unique to Mainieri aren't very familiar with how the larger world of baseball scouting works.

Those three positions have the best athletes because they're the hardest defensive positions to play. You can always move down the defensive spectrum. You very, very, very rarely see a guy move up the defensive spectrum.

This is standard scouting practice whether it's college recruiting, signing 16 year olds in the Dominican, or even drafting guys out of college. As well as along the way in the minor leagues and into their MLB career.

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I'm going to assume that usually the most talented HS players on a team play one of those three positions. I do agree that Maineri tends to recruit defense over offense but I believe Cain has been bringing in some power bats

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That's exactly what I'm saying. It's not like he goes only recruits guys that are prototype C, SS, CF. It just happens that those positions are usually where the most athletic guys on a high school team play. This is pretty much how it works for every major school in recruiting. The only thing we've lacked in the past is a true powerful L/L first baseman but we finally got one with Beloso which is refreshing.

I see you already were making the points I was making. Carry on.

Anybody else just scrolls baseball threads looking for the regular baseball guys' posts?
Trying to ignore the stupid is hard, but Project, Adam, et al makes it easier to not get frustrated with nonsense.

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That's the point I was trying to make...

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Yeah, I hadn't seen that before I posted.

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didn't think it really needed to be fleshed out cause it's pretty much how every team approaches it

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I don't think you realize the people you are trying to explain this to. It also won't matter, because those people don't let facts get in the way of their agenda.