Braden Montgomery – The Player Comps

The White Sox are at that point in their (whatever number) rebuild that you really don’t know too much about the players that are expected to rise up from the earth like the second stanza of Michael Jackson’s Thriller and take over Sox Park. Sure you might know if they are ranked, or if you attended Sox Fest LIVE! you might have caught a quick glimpse and because they had uniforms on you could match player to name, but truthfully you don’t know much about these guys. Me either. Even prospect write-ups are of limited utility to you, the everyday fan.

So, it implores me to do something that the prospect hawks hate. PLAYER COMPS!! Now, the standard explanation from these folks is each player is different and you don’t want to layer a former player over a unique player, but that’s all bullshit. They just don’t want their fucked up player comp stuck in your head when dude fails. Who wants to be the guy that claimed Brooks Baldwin got some Luis Arraez to him? You don’t want to be the guy that claimed Nick Madrigal was destined for 3,000 hits and kept calling him LASERSHOW, do you? Nah, nobody does, but here, we’ll be brave and try it. Enjoy!

If Everything Goes Wrong Braden Montgomery Will Be Lewis Brinson

Lewis Brinson was a GIGANTIC prospect of recent vintage, lots of power, speed, less arm, but more defense (ie centerfield defense) than Montgomery projects for, a highly rated prospect for about a fortnight. And…he never made it. Brinson scattered crappy performances across six different MLB seasons. In the end, the swing and miss got him. Just too many strikeouts to get to the power and make the rest of the profile work. A cautionary tale for those that hump prospect lists and can’t envision the volatile potential outcomes of those players.

If Things Go Pretty Good Braden Montgomery Will Be Jeff Francoeur

Frenchy had a ton of power and a ton of hose from right field, but the rest of the production was limited by the strikeouts. In this iteration, you have a solid everyday regular with power production and good right field defense, but volatile overall production at the plate due to the strikeouts. Some years you’ll have that solid 25 HR 90 RBI 120 OPS+ right field starter and other years it’ll be 15 HR 60 RBI 75 OPS+. I’m getting Alex Rios flashbacks as we speak.

If Everything Goes Right Braden Montgomery Will Be Darryl Strawberry

Darryl Strawberry was one of the most incredible players of my youth. He showed up and started dominating from day 1, winning ROY in 1983 and making the all-star team in eight consecutive campaigns afterwards. It was power, it was speed (including on the base paths which Montgomery might not mimic), it was good outfield defense with plus plus arm in right field. If Braden Montgomery maxes out, he’ll be a middle of the order demon that can carry the White Sox offense for a month at a time.

I probably can’t do Strawberry’s performance justice by explaining it, you’ll either have to find video of the cocaine Mets or just ogle his Baseball Reference page for some semblance of his super stardom, but believe you me, he was a star with a capital S. That would be the type of outcome that would have the natives in Southie griping about “a curse”.

So there you have it, some prospect PLAYER COMPS. Agree, disagree? Come at me bro.

-BeefLoaf