{"id":3729,"date":"2011-04-29T12:01:56","date_gmt":"2011-04-29T17:01:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/?p=3729"},"modified":"2011-04-29T12:01:56","modified_gmt":"2011-04-29T17:01:56","slug":"mlb-draft-preview-jose-fernandez-and-dillon-howard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/archives\/3729","title":{"rendered":"MLB Draft Preview: Jose Fernandez and Dillon Howard"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/dilonhoward.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-3730\" title=\"dilonhoward\" src=\"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/dilonhoward-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/dilonhoward-200x300.jpg 200w, http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/dilonhoward.jpg 222w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The back of the first round this year features a couple of high-upside prep righties in 6-foot-5, 235-pound Jose Fernandez (Alonso HS, FL) and Searcy HS\u2019s (AR) Dillon Howard.<\/p>\n<p>I had the opportunity to see Howard throw last summer for the Midland Redskins, and he was quite dominant.\u00a0 Howard flashed mid-90s a few times and consistently worked in the 91-93 mph range with an easy, athletic delivery and good sink.\u00a0 He showed a quality 12-6 curveball that featured plenty of tilt to get right-handed hitters out.\u00a0 He did not really feature a usable third pitch, but his athleticism suggests that he should pick one up with time.\u00a0 Howard is 6-foot-2 and 195-pounds and projects well physically.\u00a0 Considering there is at least a chance he slips into the supplementary round, I would not be surprised if he comes associated with a great deal of signability risk headed into June.\u00a0 He is committed to Arkansas and has a chance to open the spring as their Friday-nighter.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Fernandez is a far easier sign with quite a bit more upside due to his raw size and strength.\u00a0 Scouts have seen him up to 97 mph this spring with a quality curveball and a promising slider.\u00a0 His changeup is good enough to get lefties out as well, but has room to grow.\u00a0 Considering Fernandez\u2019s background, however, there is a very realistic chance he will take slot money come June.\u00a0 His family came to the States two years ago from Cuba, and I\u2019m guessing $1-2 million will get him signed.<\/p>\n<p><center><object style=\"height: 390px; width: 480px;\" classid=\"clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000\" width=\"100\" height=\"100\" codebase=\"http:\/\/download.macromedia.com\/pub\/shockwave\/cabs\/flash\/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0\"><param name=\"allowFullScreen\" value=\"true\" \/><param name=\"allowScriptAccess\" value=\"always\" \/><param name=\"src\" value=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/AbI-nHI96_Y?version=3\" \/><param name=\"allowfullscreen\" value=\"true\" \/><embed style=\"height: 390px; width: 480px;\" type=\"application\/x-shockwave-flash\" width=\"100\" height=\"100\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/AbI-nHI96_Y?version=3\" allowscriptaccess=\"always\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/embed><\/object><\/center><\/p>\n<p>It might take upwards of $3 million to sign Howard away from Arkansas due to his stellar and well-publicized amateur career in school, club, and showcase ball.\u00a0 My guess is that Fernandez lands in the 20-25 pick range while Howard lands in the 30-35 area.<br \/>\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The back of the first round this year features a couple of high-upside prep righties in 6-foot-5, 235-pound Jose Fernandez (Alonso HS, FL) and Searcy HS\u2019s (AR) Dillon Howard. I had the opportunity to see Howard throw last summer for the Midland Redskins, and he was quite dominant.\u00a0 Howard flashed mid-90s a few times and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,1300,8,6,9,11,13,10,775],"tags":[2172,2174,1996,2173,1396,719,2177,2176,2175],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3729"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3729"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3729\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3744,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3729\/revisions\/3744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thegoldensombrero.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}