The Red Sox made their first trade of the 2020 season on Friday night, sending Brandon Workman and Heath Hembree to the Phillies in exchange for Nick Pivetta and Connor Seabold, a pair of right-handers. We’ll have more about Pivetta in the coming days, because he’s already a big leaguer and one we’ll be seeing pretty soon, but for today I want to focus on Seabold. He’s the prospect coming back in this deal and probably the player about whom Red Sox fans should be more excited.
The referee was a three-year player at Cal State Fullerton after he was drafted in the 19th round by the Orioles from high school, but chose instead to go to college. That was a nice decision when he added his share to that of a third-round pick through the 2017 draft, when he was selected by the Phillies and signed with that organization. After sitting well in a small sample in the New York Penn League to begin his career, he was aggressively moved to High-A in his first full season as a 22-year-old. He finished that split that season between High-A and Double-A and put in well, ending the year with a 4.28 ERA over the two levels over 130 1⁄3 innings with 132 strikeouts and 32 walks.
He was looking to take a leap forward in 2019, but right after the end of camp he struggled to adjust his shoes, and an injury that caused him to miss important time early in the season. He was finally able to stop for half the year, and after a few rehab outings, he made his way back to Double-A. Once back, he returned to the mound that impressed Seabold at Reading, returning to a 2.25 ERA over seven starts and 40 innings with 36 strikeouts and ten walks. The Phillies understandably wanted the referee to get more work done after he missed so much time, so they placed him in the Arizona Fall League, where he really started to open his eyes. Seabold set after an impressive 1.06 ERA in the AFL over 17 innings with 22 strikeouts and just three walks.
Now 24 years old, we are not talking about a pitcher with an enormous ceiling, but there is a lot of optimism for Seabold to develop into a very solid starter. Listed at 6’2 “, 190 pounds, the judge did not really have an exposed pitch. Instead, he has a solid fastball that sits in the 90-93 range, along with an exchange that gets better reviews of late and a breaking ball that has received mixed ratings. Some have rated it as high as average, while others think it is a bit earlier. Where Seabold has his success, however, the edges do not hit walkers and he walks his pitches. This profile does not project to be someone who leads a rotation, but there is value in a man who is relatively close to the majors – he was on the alternative side of Philly and in a normal year would probably have been in the conversation for a while – season call when he stepped up well at Triple-A – who profiles himself as a back-of-the-rotator.
What he fits into the system is he certainly is not in the top few tiers, but he should be somewhere to the bottom of the top 20. After the concept when I was talking things out I had Blaze Jordan at number 18 after Connor Wong and Brayan Bello. After that are guys like Aldo Ramirez, Ryan Zeferjahn and Brainer Bonaci. That’s roughly where I would hit Seabold, which would probably put him at number 20 if I had to hit a hard number on it.
