Mier Officially Introduced as an Astros

The official press conference was yesterday and Jiovanni Mier and now an official member of the Astros.  With a $1.358 million signing bonus, Mier heads to Greeneville to begin his minor league career.“The fact that he signed so soon gets him into the [developmental] environment that much faster,” Ed Wade said. “We have three first-year players playing in Double-A, including our first-round pick last year and our 48th-round pick last year. These months that [Mier] has now given himself an opportunity to take advantage of will hopefully accelerate his process and get him on the express lane.”

The Astros were very pleased that Mier signed so quickly.

Now begins the career of another high pick for Houston and you wonder if it is going to be as successful as Jason Castro who is clearly prospering in Corpus Christi and looks to be a starter for the Astros in 2011, if not sooner.

Will Jiovanni be up to the task?  He’s so young, but he has the defensive mindset already.  More and more reports that I read talk about how he is a natural at shortstop.

“When we saw him at showcases, we saw the tools that you look for in a shortstop and he had all the actions that you look for,” said Doug Deutsch, the scout who followed Mier. “The ease with which he plays shortstop, for me, was very positive. It’s just not a big effort for him.”

Looking at him, I’d say he needs to gain about 50 pounds of muscle.  He’s a little guy with a shortstop body, but that isn’t going to fill out a major league uniform. (I think even slimdog Julio Lugo could run over him right now.)

He needs to work on his hitting.  A .394 average in your senior year of high school is great, but that isn’t going to hold up in front of Zach Grienke or Chris Young who are just going to get better by the time he puts on an Astro jersey.

I hope that it works out.  He will be 21 years old, at the earliest, when he enters Minute Maid Park and that seems so young to me.  But if he has the stuff and he can hit major league pitching, then he will ready.

Koby Clemens

On a side note, Koby Clemens had 6 RBIs last night for the Lancaster JetHawks.  The catcher/designated hitter looked solid and had a three-run homer to boot.