It’s a good day to be a fan of the Boston Red Sox.

The rumored trade between the Boston Red Sox and the Los Angeles Dodgers will save the east coast club more than $200 million but it will also infuses the organization with some young, cost-controlled, high-ceiling talent. Key names that are likely headed to Boston from the west coast include pitchers Rubby de la Rosa and Allen Webster, infielder Ivan DeJesus Jr., and outfielder Jerry Sands.

The Red Sox club is also said to be receiving veteran first baseman James Loney but he’s currently on a one-year contract and will be a free agent at the end of the season. It’s unlikely that he’d be re-signed given that he’s been at or below replacement level for the past five seasons (although a move away from Los Angeles should help his offensive numbers to a degree).

The key to the deal is de la Rosa. A hard-throwing native of the Dominican Republic, just 23 years old, he has the ceiling of a No. 2 starter. Only his lack of consistent command and control keep the No. 1 label from being adhered to de la Rosa. There are also some concerns over the durability of the hurler who underwent Tommy John surgery during the 2011 season. He doesn’t have the largest frame and puts a lot of strain on his body by reaching triple-digits with his fastball. His secondary pitches – a changeup and slider – both showed a lot of potential pre-surgery but he’s made just five official appearances since returning from the disable list.

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My first trip to the Appalachian League brought me to two parks in Elizabethton and Greeneville which could not have been more different. Elizabethton, a small town outside of Johnson City, Tennessee housed the Twins at an older parks & recreation facility. Considering the high school football opener happening a couple of miles away, about a thousand people showing up for the ballgame was a solid crowd.

Two things about the Elizabethton Twins struck me as interesting. At a time when minor league baseball is big business, the franchise was still run by the city. The General Manager of the club was also the city Parks and Recreation Manager. Ron Swanson most certainly would have been proud!

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The author attended Wednesday night’s game — or, at least, the first eight innings of it — between the Class A Midwest League affiliates of the Minnesota Twins (the Beloit Snappers) and Chicago Cubs (the Peoria Chiefs) in Beloit, Wisconsin. Below are some notes on same.

Please note: none of what follows constitutes Official Prospect Analysis.

Regarding Miguel Sano and Jorge Soler
Miguel Sano and Jorge Soler are presently the most high-profile prospects on Beloit and Peoria, respectively, the former having been ranked 27th by Marc Hulet on his (i.e. Hulet’s) midseason top-50 prospect list and the latter having signed a nine-year, $30 million contract with the Cubs after having defected from Cuba earlier this year.

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The Chicago White Sox organization has done an outstanding job of squeezing every ounce of value out of its prospects this season.

Back in March, four prospect analysts/publications (FanGraphs, Baseball America, Keith Law, Kevin Goldstein) all agreed – in separate rankings of the 30 organizations in baseball – that the White Sox club was indeed the weakest in all of Major League Baseball in terms of prospects.

The perceived lack of quality hasn’t stopped the club from trotting out 12 rookies this season – for a combined value of 3.1 WAR. The majority of the contributions have come from the pitching side. Only outfielder Jordan Danks and infielder Eduardo Escobar – since traded to the Minnesota Twins for Francisco Liriano – have played the field for the White Sox. Danks has managed to provide 0.2 WAR, while Escobar was in the negative prior to his departure.

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New York Mets pitching prospect Domingo Tapia is in the midst of a breakout season for Savannah of the South Atlantic League. With nearly eight strikeouts per nine innings and a ground ball rate of 65%, his 2.65 FIP is good for second best in the league behind San Francisco Giants 2011 supplemental first round pick Kyle Crick. So what’s driving his success? A mid-to-upper 90’s fastball with heavy sink which rates as one of the single best pitches I’ve scouted in person. But what about the rest of his arsenal? It lags significantly behind, but Tapia may be taking a rather unique approach to to starting as an attempt to maximize what the young right-hander does well.

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With about a month left in the minor league baseball season, one of 2012’s worst kept secrets has been the prodigious speed of Cincinnati Reds shortstop prospect Billy Hamilton. With 139 stolen bases entering today’s action, Hamilton is six away from the minor league record of 145 set by Vince Coleman in 1983.

Video after the Jump

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Last week, we took a look at the 14 American League sleeper prospects I identified during the pre-season FanGraphs Top 15 prospects series. Today, we’re reviewing the 15 National League sleeper prospects.

I apologize for the lateness of the second part of this series, which was intended to run one day after the AL portion. However, my wife went into labor two weeks early with our second child. The good news, though, is that the world has a new baseball fan.

Navery Moore, RHP, Atlanta Braves: Moore showcased a good arm in college but suffered from inconsistent performances. Now 22, the right-hander has spent the entire season in low-A ball. He made 11 starts to begin the year and then moved into the bullpen and he’s probably more suited to relieving.

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One of the more enjoyable parts of the annual Top 15 prospects lists that I do at FanGraphs is unearthing and writing about new, unpolished prospect gems. As a result, I added an extra player to each Top 15 list during the pre-2012 series and highlighted a “sleeper prospect” that did not make it into the featured group.

The minor league regular season ends in less than a month and the 2013 Top 15 prospect lists are already forming in my mind so I though it would be a good time to reflect back on my collection of sleepers and see how many of them woke up.

Dalton Pompey, OF, Toronto Blue Jays: Pompey, 19, was assigned to short-season Vancouver to begin 2012 and was looking good (20.5 BB%, 172 wRC+) before a broken hamate bone in his left wrist wiped out his season after just 11 games.

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During Jean Segura’s six year minor league baseball career, he has proven to be a very productive player when healthy. After missing a substantial amount of time in 2011, the young shortstop has rebounded with a .304/.358/.413 line in 2012 including a scorching .433/.500/.533 over his last ten games prior to being promoted. As the key piece in a deal sending Zack Greinke to Los Angeles, the Milwaukee Brewers are counting on Segura’s minor league numbers translating into major league production on the middle infield. Having seen Segura during his last two starts for Double-A Huntsville of the Southern League, I’m confident the Brewers have acquired a talented — but unrefined — player. Segura is likely to need additional seasoning at the minor league level before cementing himself as an everyday player.

Video below the jump

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Back in mid-March I took a look at some interesting names that were making the conversion from minor league hitters to pitchers. The biggest success, so far, has been the emergence of Oakland’s Sean Doolittle who has now pitched 23.1 big league innings. Let’s see how everyone is doing as the minor league regular season starts to wind down.

Kyler Burke, Chicago Cubs (CF to LHP)

Burke, 24, is the rare conversion project who is being used in the starting rotation, as opposed to the bullpen. Hitters-turned-pitchers usually have more success in the bullpen because they have fewer pitches to polish and can move quickly (They’re typically older and a few years behind the eight ball once they start pitching). Burke began the year in low-A ball and made 15 appearances (10 starts) and is now pitching in high-A where he’s made another eight starts. His control has been good but his strikeout rate is low at 6.64 K/9. He could be ready for double-A to begin 2013.

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