(whistles)

I think rdave covered a good amount of it, but I think I can add more.

You know Kuo-hui Lo? The rarely mentioned other outfielder in High Desert because you can apparently slug .538 there and be a total non-prospect? I can see them as being in a similar order of prospects, specifically the tweener outfielder.

Lo hasn’t played center that often. He’s flashed a little more power this season, but his footspeed and his batting eye are not great. The market is not huge for a right-handed hitting corner outfielder who can hit 20 doubles, 10 triples or so (I believe the Cal League exaggerates those), and 15 dingers.

McOwen has more raw speed and a better batting eye (walks twice as much, strikes out maybe a third less). He also has a few more outfield assists from what I remember, but I could be wrong on that one. Last year he was one of the few players in the farm system who stole thirty bases, not that he was great it or anything, but this year he’s on pace for about ten. Coupled with his inability to get PT in center (Gillies is pretty good), that and the [ever so] slightly diminished power output is damaging his status as a prospect. In any other circumstance, his line would look good, but he’s turning into an average reliant hitter limited to a corner, whereas before his offensive package was worse but he could play in center.

A friend of mine threw out the comp of Randy Winn for McOwen, perhaps the early Randy Winn or a poor man’s version of the early Saunders before the recent power renaissance. I think that’s fair, but handedness aside, I don’t see him as being particularly interesting UNLESS he can also play center now and then, and that he’s not even getting time out there even as a courtesy is enough to make me not want to talk him up more.

I reserve the right to be wrong if this newly opened stance allows for more offense than we’re accustomed to seeing out of him, but I would really like to see him in center now and then.