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 The rarity of Justin Morneau is starting to sink in with the Minnesota Twins.
New Westminster's Morneau, 19, the third-round pick of the Twins in Major League Baseball's 1999 amateur draft, set records in his just-completed first full professional season and "has a very good chance to win our Minor League Player of the Year award," the Twins said last week.
Morneau, a product of the North Delta Blue Jays of the BC Premier League, led the Rookie-level Gulf Coast League (GCL) in six hitting categories in 2000 and finished a close second in two more.
The six-foot four, 215-pound catcher set league records with a .402 average and 58 RBI in 52 games, and with four more home runs - he hit 10 - he would have led his league in HRs and won hitting's Triple Crown.
"Morneau's as good a hitter as I've ever seen at this level," said Darryl Kennedy, manager of the league champion GCL Rangers. "He hits to all fields for both average and power."
In late September, Baseball America magazine named Morneau the fourth best major league prospect in the GCL.
His performance helps to justify Morneau's relatively high ranking in baseball's amateur draft. His selection in the third round in 1999 is believed to be the highest ever for a Canadian in his high school year, indicating just how much Minnesota regarded his potential.
"He might be the top prospect within the Twins organization," said Montreal Expos area scout and North Delta Blue Jays coach Ari Mellios, who guided Morneau's baseball development in the BC Premier League from ages 16 through 18.
"He has uncanny aptitude as a hitter," Mellios said. "He has the ability to make adjustments in the middle of the game. He doesn't get fooled. He understands the game very, very well."
Morneau is blessed, too, with the prime physical tools for hitting: quick hands, and the ability to generate tremendous bat speed. "He can pull a 94-mile-an-hour fastball on the inside corner. That's bat speed," Mellios said.
His superb eye and bat control is demonstrated by Morneau's 30 bases on balls versus 18 strikeouts in his record-setting GCL season. It's exceptional to find a batter who walks more often that he strikes out, especially so among power hitters.
One month ago, Minnesota welcomed Morneau to the club's Instructional League camp in Florida for six weeks of advanced baseball education. Invitations are reserved for an organization's blue-chip prospects.
"He's going places," said Bill Green, a member of the Major League Scouting Bureau and coach of the Coquitlam Reds of the BC Premier League. Green's Reds played Morneau's Blue Jays for three seasons, and Green coached the Royal City youngster on the BC Selects baseball squad.
"I saw him a lot at 16, 17, 18. He's a good ballplayer," said Green, whose scouting report on Morneau highlighted the youngster's hitting ability, especially his home-run-hitting prowess.
"When you say a kid can hit and hit with power, it gets peoples' attention. Not many kids get those kind of reports," Green said.
Fewer still are the pure hitters with good power who are catchers. The fact that Morneau is a left-handed hitter - a highly desirable trait in a catcher - adds even more lustre to the package.
"It's not unusual to have first baseman who hit 25, 30 home runs," Mellios explained. "First base is the least-demanding position defensively, so good hitters will end up there who can't play somewhere else.
"But a catcher who hits 30 home runs? Now you're talking (New York Mets all-star catcher Mike) Piazza. That's a different creature altogether. That's 'wow.'"
And therein lies a pleasant problem for the Twins. Morneau is most valuable as a catcher, but could help Minnesota sooner if he played another position.
The organization is torn between developing Morneau as a major-league catcher, which typically takes four or more years in the minors, or as a first baseman, which is usually a quicker path to the majors.
"He's placed the Twins in a real predicament, but it's a nice problem to have," Mellios said.
Morneau split time at first base and catcher in the GCL this year and is working out at both positions in the Instructional League.
Regardless of which position Morneau ends up calling home, Mellios, Green and other Lower Mainland baseball observers said he can reach the major leagues if he continues to play to his potential and progress as a ballplayer.
"He has a tremendous work ethic," Mellios said.
"He can make it because he can hit, no matter what position he plays," Green said. "As long as he continues to hit, he will move up."
Morneau advanced from the GCL to Elizabethtown of the Appalachian League, another Rookie circuit, after completing his season on the Gulf Coast. He caught all five games he played for Elizabethtown to the end of August.
He is hoping to reach one of Minnesota's two A-ball affiliates to begin next season, either Quad City River Bandits of the Midwest League or Fort Meyers Miracle of the Florida State League.
Burnaby NOW, October 2000
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