The Orioles announced Thursday morning that they’ve signed first-round pick Vance Honeycutt. The UNC outfielder, selected with the No. 22 overall pick, was the last remaining unsigned first-round pick after ECU righty Trey Yesavage — the No. 20 overall selection — agreed to terms with the Blue Jays less than an hour ago. Honeycutt will take home a $4MM bonus, reports Jim Callis of MLB.com, which sits a bit north of his $3.802MM slot value.
Honeycutt, 21, played three seasons for the Tar Heels and batted a combined .293/.412/.638 during his NCAA career — including a massive .318/.410/.714 batting line and 28 home runs during his junior season. Those 28 round-trippers tied him with No. 1 overall pick Travis Bazzana for seventh in all of Division-I baseball.
The 6’3″, 205-pound Honeycutt has clear raw power, and in spite of his gaudy batting line it’s his defensive acumen for which he draws the most praise. He’s a two-time ACC Defensive Player of the Year who scouts believe can stick in center field while showing plus range and a plus arm. Eye-catching as his 28 homers and hefty slash stats were throughout his career, Honeycutt has regularly punched out at a high rate, including during his junior season when he went down on strikes in 27.5% of his plate appearances. He still drew walks at a strong 11.9% clip, but the frequent punchouts have created a relatively wide range of opinions.
Baseball America, for instance, ranked him as the draft’s No. 13 prospect. Other outlets weren’t all so bullish. MLB.com listed him 22nd. ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel ranked him 25th. Keith Law of The Athletic tabbed him as the No. 41 prospect, and FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen ranked him 42nd. That still makes him one of the consensus top position players in the draft and a clear Day 1 talent, but Honeycutt’s shaky contact skills create a broad range of offensive outcomes, even as his power, speed and defensive aptitude give him a reasonable floor. Callis and colleague Jonathan Mayo perhaps put it best in their scouting writeup for MLB.com: “How much Honeycutt hits will determine if he becomes Drew Stubbs or better than that.”
80 on the name tool.
…Distant cousin of Rick (probably not)
Nope.
65. Honeycutt Vance would be an 80. As in 1880, amirite.
If he faces Honeywell in a major league at bat, that will be a saccharine showdown.
One heck of A B! (give it a sec)
Knowing the way the Orioles have developed a lot of young prospects, it wouldn’t surprise me if he mashes in the minors and forces them to give him a look sometime next season!
That’s probably a bit optimistic, but it wouldn’t be shocking if he progressed something like Dylan Beavers, another of our toolsy but raw first round college OFs who also needed significant tweaks after he was drafted but is now a top 5-7 prospect in the system.
Drew Stubbs? A kick in the crotch!
Hoping for the best with Honeycutt. speed, D and power can be sweet, but he is going to have fix the sticky problem of plate discipline.
I’m a little surprised that he held the O’s ransom over what ended up being about 5% overslot. I would have guessed the opposite direction of an underslot signing as it seems that most of the pundits were weary of the possibility of him going Full Joey Gallo on the Birds.
I gotta like the self confidence that he was holding out and confident in his abilities to succeed in pro ball.
Say what you want about Drew Stubbs, but he’s sitting on a little over 15-M’s right now. That’s pretty much all that needs to be said
And they got an extra pick at the end of the 1st rd as the prospect promotion incentive pick (Gunnar winning RoY) — wow, keep on!
…and pissed it away on O’Ferrall
No love for the name Trey Yesavage? That name is straight out of some dime novel.
It’s quite a Savage name indeed.
He has a sweet swing… some might say a honey cut.
Not a fan of guys with huge K numbers in college but he has a lot of potential.
The Os will not be able to maintain a payroll high enough to keep all their blue chips. Eventually their sell off will make the WhiteSox method look tame.
You know they have the richest ownership group in baseball right? People forget Michael Bloomberg is the last minority owner worth 100 billion.
Doesn’t matter. Biggest myth baseball fans maintain is how rich the owners are determines how much they spend on payroll. They spend what the team brings in (minus some profit). Period. No owner subsidizes the team from his/her own wallet.
Where did I say they were going to do that? It does make a difference when your previous owner one way of earning a living was from his baseball team. This team that the previous guy is talking about selling off has 30 percent increase in ticket sales, increase in the tv viewers and playoff ticket sales coming. They operated at 35% payroll to revenue last year which was 28th in the league. There is plenty of room to make more revenue and add salary to keep players.
Sorry the Mariners don’t spend that much, Seamaholic.
That’s not true. Cohen put 100 mil of his money into the Mets coffers.
What’s a minority owner going to do? Do you think he’s spending his own money to make someone else money?
That’s kind of the idea.
In terms of market and revenue, the Orioles are a small to midmarket team, and they’re in a division with the Yankees and Red Sox (which could afford to spend more $.) Because of the deal Bud Selig made with Angelos, both the O’s and Nats are stuck with MASN. Plus, Angelos kept losing in court and the Nats are owed a lot of $. Both teams currently get $60 mil a year from that deal in perpituity. The O’s cannot get more than that without costing themselves money in court because they’d be admitting the Nats legal position is correct.
Because Angelos turned off so many fans, and the Nats moved to DC the Orioles average crowd size has been smaller than even the Nats despite being *much* better on the field. Because their market’s different, their average ticket price will almost certainly remain lower than the Yankees and Red Sox (and even the Nats.)
The Orioles are never going to be major players in free agency. They’re going to have to win with player development, properly evaluating guys when they get to MLB and signing them to long term deals before they get to free agency. If they can’t sign a guy they’ll flip him for prospects, and it’s “next man up.”