PG in the Pros: Carlos Correa

Feature Photo:  Carlos Correa (Photo by Perfect Game)

pg-2080bsb-1000x600The glass always seemed half empty for many scouts when it came to Carlos Correa before the Houston Astros took the 17-year old Puerto Rican with the first overall pick in the 2012 MLB First- Year Player Draft. There seemed be constant worry about whether the 6-foot-3 inch, 190-pound teenager would outgrow shortstop and end up as a third baseman. And if he did wind up at third instead of playing at a premium middle-infield position, what would his potential ceiling be?

There was also a very established group of eight players who clearly stood out at the top of the first round in that year’s MLB Draft. Byron Buxton‘s physical tools were absolutely huge. Scouts, who rarely use the 80 grade, were dropping 80 speed and 80 arm strength numbers on him. Kevin Gausman, Kyle Zimmer and Mark Appel were throwing consistently in the mid-90s with plus command and plus breaking balls. Catcher Mike Zunino played a premium position and dominated college baseball at the University of Florida. And Albert Almora and Max Fried were talented and polished high school standouts with lots of projection left on already-established track records.

Prior to the 2012 draft, there was also an undercurrent of uneasiness about how well, and how thoroughly, scouts had evaluated Correa, which seems wildly ironic in retrospect because of the huge amounts of money given to even younger and less well-traveled Dominican and Venezuelan prospects every year. While Correa had plenty of experience in the United States (two PG Game World Showcases, the PG National Showcase, the WWBA World and Underclass Championships, the PG All-American Classic and the East Coast Professional Showcase), you have to go all the way back to Ramon Castro, the Astros’ first-round pick (17th overall) in 1994, to find the next highest Puerto Rican pick since the island entered the draft in 1989.

There was one person in particular who didn’t see the glass as being half empty, but rather filled to the brim regarding Correa. I’ve known Perfect Game founder and president Jerry Ford for about 20 years, and I can say without reservation that I’ve never seen him as enthusiastic – even emotional – about a player as he was about Carlos Correa. There was no question that Correa held a permanent place at number one in the PG Class of 2012 rankings.

I saw Correa play for perhaps 12 to 14 days between January, 2011 and January, 2012 in both game and showcase settings. The thing that always confused me, just as it did with Jerry Ford, was the consistent talk from the scouting community that Correa was going to outgrow the shortstop position and end up at third base. I just didn’t see it.

Carlos Correa, SS, Astros

Correa was an average 6.8 runner in the sixty, but far more important was the athletic grace that he played with defensively. There was nothing that was physically difficult for him to do at shortstop. He was always balanced and his footwork was natural and clean. Correa wasn’t flashy, but then again he didn’t have to be, and flashy isn’t part of his personality on or off the field. His hands were quick, and if you saw him start a 6-4-3 double play when he had to go a few feet to his right to get the ball, you’d see that the play was a very natural athletic action for him.

And then there was the arm strength. If scouts were going to toss around an 80 grade for Buxton’s raw arm strength from center field, there was no reason to hold back on Correa’s grade from shortstop. He threw a PG-record 97 mph across the diamond at the 2012 PG World Showcase, and he did it with textbook game-speed footwork, not the more customary showcase wind up for the radar gun. I still have a picture in my mind of the throw that registered 97 mph. It was actually on a backhand ground ball that he circled perfectly with all his momentum going towards first base.

I think that most scouts at the time, being conservative creatures of both habit and learning, placed the “third base future” on Correa as a cliché for his size and age. But there are exceptions to the “too big to play shortstop” cliché, and those exceptions are players that scouts are very hesitant to invoke the names of in their evaluations. Comparing a young Carlos Correa to Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter or Cal Ripken Jr. just isn’t something one does lightly in this profession.

But if you were ever going to do just that, this was the time to do it.

There was far less debate and uncertainly about Correa’s bat and offensive potential. His stride and swing were long at times when I saw him in January, 2011 but over the next year he did a very impressive job of shortening everything up while maintaining the same type of elite-level bat speed. He consistently saw the ball well, and it was easy to forecast a hitter who would post very decent walk numbers and low strikeout totals for a power hitter. And Correa always performed on the biggest stages.

Carlos Correa , SS, Astros (Photo by Tony Firriolo/MLB Photos via Getty Images)

At the same 2012 World Showcase that Correa threw 97 mph across the infield, he also put on a power display for the ages. It’s been written here before that the Stadium Field at Terry Park in Fort Myers is perhaps the most difficult field in the country to hit home runs. The dimensions are huge and the air is heavy. During batting practice, Correa hit a ball over the scoreboard in left-center field that might be the longest ball ever hit at Terry Park at a PG event. Then, in the first game, against a pitcher throwing 88 to 90, he hit a ball in almost the exact same spot. Correa didn’t always show his big power, and had more of a line drive, gap-to-gap approach even in batting practice, but when he got a pitch to turn on, he recognized it and the power came out quickly and loudly.

Correa took a whirlwind tour to work out and interview with the teams with top picks in the weeks prior to 2012 draft. His stop in Houston, by all accounts, was hugely successful both on and off the field. And, indeed, it was Correa’s personality and character that was the true separator in the end. It was something, in retrospect, that clearly makes him one of the potential best players in the game today.

It was also something that was very evident, even a year before the draft, to everyone at Perfect Game who had a chance to spend time with Correa at events. He was mature well beyond his years. He was completely bilingual, comfortably moving between cultures and languages. He was as polite and respectful as any young man could be. Correa came from a blue-collar background in Puerto Rico, with his father working in construction and his mother in retail sales, but he was the Puerto Rican Baseball Academy/High School class valedictorian and a 4.0 student with a solid SAT score who could have gone to most any college in the United States. It was clear that he would be very successful in life, even without any baseball talent.

Correa’s willingness to sign for a below-slot $4.8 million bonus certainly didn’t hurt the Astros’ decision to select Correa with the first overall pick in 2012, as it fit perfectly with their strategy to conserve money to sign players like Lance McCullers and Rio Ruiz with later-round picks. But Correa was clearly the best pick, even if many didn’t share that opinion at the time.