Philadelphia Phillies Prospect Countdown #10: Roman Quinn

Roman Quinn

20 years old  (May, 14, 1993)

5’10” 170 lbs.

Bats: Both  Throws: Right

Positives

Speed, speed and more speed.  Roman Quinn was arguably the second-fastest player in the minor leagues last season.  On a 20/80 scouting scale, he has 80-grade speed.  Translation: he can fly.  (Could fly.  We’ll get to that later.)  Has stolen 62 bases during his first two years in professional baseball.  Quinn has a solid approach at the plate for a player his age.  He makes consistent contact and shortens his stroke on a two-strike count.  Has a very wiry, athletic body (reminds me of Jimmy Rollins at that age).  Gap power – 16 doubles and 14 triples over the two seasons.

Defensively, he has a very strong and accurate throwing arm.  Quinn uses his athleticism and quickness to get to balls that others cannot.  He is also an intelligent player who loves being at the ballpark.

Weaknesses

Image source: https://twitter.com/baseballswag4

He does lack power.  He has hit only six home runs in 607 professional plate appearances.  Offensively, he plays more like a shortstop from the 1970’s and 80’s – solid defense with limited power.  Even though he makes consistent contact, many balls are weakly hit.  Therefore, he has to rely on his speed to beat out infield choppers.

Even though he gets to many grounders, his glove is quite suspect.  Quinn makes entirely too many errors to be a consistent big league shortstop.  Even though he is extremely smooth and quick in the field, it does not translate to the glove.  He made 31 errors while playing for Single-A Lakewood in 2013 – and has made 58 errors over his first two seasons.  That’s an .896 Fielding Percentage, and that won’t cut it at the big league level.  The large majority of the miscues are of the fielding variety – not throwing.

Outlook

First-and-foremost, Quinn needs to shake the injury bug.  He missed significant playing time in 2013 due to a fractured bone in his left wrist.  Now comes the big problem for a player whose bread-and-butter is his lightning speed: a ruptured Achilles.  Quinn ruptured his right Achilles tendon while running sprints in Florida during the offseason.  He will obviously miss a significant portion of the 2014 campaign, if not all of it.  One has to wonder if he will ever regain that 80-grade speed again.

The injury will be a major setback for a player who has already been passed on the prospect depth chart at shortstop (J.P. Crawford).  If Crawford truly is the future at shortstop for the Philadelphia Phillies, then one of two things will have to happen.  Quinn will have to learn another position(s) or he will be traded.  In my opinion, when Quinn gets back out on the field, the Phillies will have him play some second base and center field as well as continuing at shortstop.

A player who is that athletically gifted should not have a problem to adapting to either position.

ETA: 2017