Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, D’Backs, Twins, Astros, Cubs, Reds, Phillies, Rays, Mets, Padres, Marlins, Nationals, Red Sox, White Sox, Orioles & Yankees

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

Amateur Coverage: 2015 Draft Rankings, 2015 July 2 Top Prospects & Latest on Yoan Moncada

Something that came up on every call with an Orioles official was their internal prospect list. Most teams I’ve talked to don’t have a consensus list; maybe a list a couple people in the office maintain with agreed-upon tiers of players, but not one that the whole organization refers to. Others in the org maintain their own lists as well. At one point or another, this master list was referenced enough that I saw some trends where the Orioles own list would diverge from my own.

They skewed high for the near big league ready players, with down list players like Dariel Alvarez and Henry Urrutia much higher than I have them and thus some lower level players like Stephen Tarpley lower than I have them. As you would expect, they also have some information a typical scout may not have, regarding injuries and progress in private workouts, so some players with subpar 2014 season are higher than I have them, like Urrutia, Michael Almanzar and Josh Hart. Other than those two main differences, our lists ended up being pretty similar, with only a handful of players we disagreed on that didn’t fall into one of those two groups.

There’s positives and negatives of having such a list. The official-ness of it means it gets referenced internally all the time and is the starting point for trade talks, so it can morph the internal dialogue about a player for better or worse. While it’s less divisive than it was 10 years ago, there is also still a scouts vs. stats divide on subjects like prospect lists in most organizations, since the evaluation method (particularly on high minors players with lots of data) differs a good bit.  There’s also a positive to having the dialogue that leads to a consensus list, so various factions within the organization know where “their” guys stand and thus know when to speak up in-season if they think their guy warrants a better ranking.

The O’s have had solid drafts under the Dan Duquette regime; they haven’t had tons of extra picks or a high draft position to give them the money or opportunity to get the super elite prospect. That said, the early returns are solid considering that and their lower investment in international bonuses, with Jomar Reyes looking like a steal less than a year after signing.   There’s also depth in pitching at the upper levels, with 5 of the top 12 prospects being pitchers that could contribute in the big leagues in 2015.  From my current ranking of the farm systems of all 30 organizations, I have Baltimore 18th, which may still change before I formally publish those rankings.

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We’re right in the thick of prospect ranking season right now, with all of the national prospect writers feverishly emailing scouts their top 100 lists and making adjustments with plans to unveil them in the next couple weeks or so.  I’ll hold the details of what and when we’ll be putting up our list, but it will likely be well over 100 players. I’m nothing if not wordy.

Undermining Team Prospect Lists

An interesting thing I’ve noticed while balancing the individual team list research with the overall big list research is how team lists change after I’ve posted them. The reasons I give FVs to players is to categorize them, guessing where I’ll put them in a top 100, to save some time. It’s inevitable, then, that some player I call a 50 FV on his team list will end up being ranked ahead of a that I call a 55 FV on his team’s list. This is expected and part of the reason I’ll be continually updating the team lists (more on this at a later date), so that discrepancy in the team list will be fixed after the big list goes up.

When I write a team list, I talk to 3-5 people with the club, then more from outside the club. I massage the data into a list and usually feel pretty good about it. When I combine all these team lists into a big list, I feel pretty good about it and then I send it to scouts and execs from every team and when I get replies, I start feeling less good about it.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, D’Backs, Twins, Astros, Cubs, Reds, Phillies, Rays, Mets, Padres, Marlins, Nationals, Red Sox, White Sox & Orioles

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

Amateur Coverage: 2015 Draft Rankings, 2015 July 2 Top Prospects & Latest on Yoan Moncada

I liked the Nationals’ deal to move Steven Souza for Trea Turner and Joe Ross and they’re doing a nice job finding prospects despite lower draft position and international bonus pool. Being aggressive with injured pitchers in the draft (Giolito) has already paid off big and may soon pay off again (Fedde).

Stacking this system up with the other 14 I’ve done so far, I realize the reason I don’t have a ton to say is the Nationals system is very average, which is an accomplishment given that they are perennial contenders focused on their big league team: they haven’t busted their international pool, gone after high profile international free agents or had the extra picks to spend as much as some other big market clubs with better systems.

Washington made the most of their time in the cellar (and were fortunate that it coincided with Bryce Harper‘s and Stephen Strasburg’s draft years), will make a deal for prospects when they like the value, have a couple high end prospects (which some teams with higher draft positions still don’t have), a solid middle class with okay depth, along with some longer shot upside bets to watch. I’d bet they end up in the 13-17 area when I rank the systems at the end of this process, which shows a large net positive contribution from the scouting and player development staffs.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, D’Backs, Twins, Astros, Red Sox, Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Phillies, Rays, Mets, Padres, Marlins & Nationals

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

Amateur Coverage: 2015 Draft Rankings, 2015 July 2 Top Prospects & Latest on Yoan Moncada

The Marlins are at an interesting place in their development cycle. We’ve seen them be at every stage of the spectrum, from rebuilding to contender, over the last couple decades and now they’re flipping young players for ready-made big leaguers to put around Giancarlo Stanton while he’s in his prime. It remains to be seen how much of a contender they will be in 2015, but it’s clear a switch has been flipped and that’s evident in what the system looks like.

It isn’t that top heavy and it isn’t particularly deep in tradable assets, but I liked what the Marlins did in the later rounds in the most recent draft. The club told me they had leaned to pitching in recent drafts and needed hitters. They identified a number of lower six figure prep hitting prospects to help stock the lower rungs of the system. Going under-slot in the sandwich round for prep catcher Blake Anderson helped them do that; it’ll be a few years before we know if this draft strategy will pay off.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, D’Backs, Twins, Astros, Red Sox, Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Phillies, Rays, Mets, Padres & Marlins

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

Amateur Coverage: 2015 Draft Rankings, 2015 July 2 Top Prospects & Latest on Yoan Moncada

This list was gutted by five deals over an 12-day period earlier this month by new general manager A.J. Preller. He generally turned minor league pieces into big league pieces and these deals included 11 guys that would’ve been on this list: Trea Turner, Max Fried, Zach Eflin, Joe Ross, Joe Wieland, Mallex Smith, Jace Peterson, R.J. Alvarez, Johnny Barbato, Jake Bauers and Dustin Peterson, in that order.

Jesse Hahn would’ve been on the growth assets list and Burch Smith may have snuck on the end of the list but would likely be one of the last cuts, appearing in the others of note section. The lack of depth in the list below is understandable as a slightly above average system became a slightly below average one in the last month or so. Padres sources were quick to point out that only Justin Upton and Shawn Kelley were one-year assets, so this isn’t an all-in sort of move, but more of a reorganizing of the assets.

It’s interesting that the Rangers, where Preller worked until recently, have a reputation of not wanting to part with any prospects in trades. Preller came into a situation in San Diego where he didn’t sign any of the players he had and he immediately shipped one-third of the legitimate prospects out within a couple months, with no list-worthy prospects coming back in these deals. That’s somewhat misleading, as Preller’s job is to win big league games and a farm system exists to improve the big league team, but it’s interesting to note the contrast in styles.

Another big topic that came up on all my calls for this list was the recent history of Padres pitching prospects getting hurt. There have been somewhat recent Tommy John surgeries for Casey Kelly, Max Fried, Joe Wieland and Cory Luebke (twice) among the legitimate prospects, but the team has no explanation for why they’ve been hit harder than others. Padres execs detailed a study to me that was commissioned to answer this question and there were no common factors across the injuries and there didn’t appear to be problems with their throwing programs. It appears to just be rolling snake eyes a few more times than everyone else did, through random bad luck.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, D’Backs, Twins, Astros, Red Sox, Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Phillies, Rays, Mets & Padres

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

I mentioned this with the Reds system as well, but I was surprised how strong the Mets system ended up being after I made all of my calls. They have a nice crop of talent on the MLB growth assets list, upper level talent that could be everyday players and some intriguing guys at the lower levels.  The organization has been aggressive in targeting top minor league talents in trades (Zack Wheeler, Noah Syndergaard, Travis d’Arnaud, Dilson Herrera), going after top talent on July 2nd and doing well in the draft, with all recent top picks still on the prospect radar.

One thing to keep an eye on in spring training is the MLB/AAA pitching glut.  With the big league rotation looking right now like it’ll be Matt Harvey, Zack Wheeler, Jacob deGrom, Jon Niese and Bartolo Colon, that leaves seven arms with prospect value (Noah Syndergaard, Rafael Montero, Dillon Gee, Matt Bowman, Cory Mazzoni, Steven Matz and Gabriel Ynoa) as candidates for five Triple-A rotation spots or the big league bullpen.  This logjam is what made Logan Verrett expendable in the Rule 5 draft; it should cause roster crunch issues and also valuable depth to a Mets team on the rise.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, Diamondbacks, Twins, Astros, Red Sox, Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Phillies & Rays

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

The common narrative about the Rays system is that 1) it’s down from past years and 2) this is because they can’t pick good players unless they pick in the top 10.  Over the 19 years of the franchise, here’s the 7 productive big leaguers over 9 tries they’ve picked from the top 6 overall slots: David Price, Evan Longoria, Josh Hamilton, Rocco Baldelli, B.J. Upton, Jeff Niemann and Delmon Young.

In 21 first round/sandwich picks outside of the top 6 slots, they’ve produced no big leaguers of consequence and the top current prospects of the group are Justin O’Conner (#2) and Blake Snell (#5) on the list below.  There’s obviously something to these critiques, but it’s important to keep in mind that the return from draft picks is exponential: the top few picks are supposed to produce far more value than late first round picks.

Due to all the extra high-round picks and farm-stocking trades, along with an increasingly prominent international program, the Rays system is as deep as almost any other.  Because the high bonus players haven’t worked out for Tampa Bay at even a league average rate, the top of the system is much weaker than others and their #1 prospect was acquired in a recent trade, along with #4 and #8.  There’s enough young, high-upside talent for this high-end shortage to change by this time next year, but it’s impossible to forecast something like that happening.

It’s also worth noting that 8 of the 31 prospects ranked here were acquired via trade; the Rays system has to be deep given the way the organization approaches roster building.  If the system was run like a big market team perennially in the playoffs (think Detroit), where prospects are traded once they have trade value to prop up the big league team, the Rays farm system could pretty easily be the worst in baseball due to their struggles in the draft.

Two things to monitor in the system is the catching depth (which took a hit when Arizona took Oscar Hernandez #1 overall in the Rule 5 Draft last week) and the glut of infielders with prospect value that fit best in Triple-A Durham. Behind Ryan Hanigan and Curt Casali at the big league level, the Rays’ primary catchers starting in Triple-A and moving down the chain should be Luke Maile, Justin O’Conner, Hernandez (who most expect to be returned by Arizona), Nick Ciuffo, David Rodriguez and Rafelin Lorenzo, all of whom are mentioned below as prospects, which is very rare.

In the Durham glut, the Rays have SS, Hak-Ju Lee, SS Jake Hager, SS Tim Beckham, 2B/SS Nick Franklin, 2B Ryan Brett and 3B/1B Richie Shaffer, all with varying levels of prospect value.  There’s hope that one or two of these guys could play their way onto the 25-man MLB roster, but the organization is aware that, barring injuries, some players may have to play out of position or at a lower level than expected to make things work.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, Diamondbacks, Twins, Astros, Red Sox, Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Phillies, Rays & Mets

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

The Phillies are an easy target for the Internet and you’d expect the system to not be very strong, given the way the organization is characterized online.  The system isn’t great and the production from the draft hasn’t been very strong, which is a big reason why they recently hired a new scouting director.

It is worth pointing out that the Latin program is propping up the system right now, despite not having huge budgets, producing 6 of the top 16 prospects in the system.  Of the other ten, one is from a trade, eight were first or second round picks and the last one was a third round pick.  The Latin program run by Sal Agostinelli is propping up a system that only stands out right now because of two recent first round picks in Crawford and Nola.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, Diamondbacks, Twins, Astros, Red Sox, Cubs, White Sox, Reds & Phillies

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

If you asked me before I started making calls on the Reds what I expected from their system, I would’ve said average to a bit below.  I was surprised to find they have at least average depth and a surprising amount of high end talent; they have an above-average eight 50+ FV players and three more that could’ve been in that group.  While there isn’t a slam-dunk, top-20 overall prospect in the bunch, this is an impressive group, buoyed by aggressive international signings and an instinct to look for talent in unusual places in the draft.

One of those tendencies is going after athletic relievers with three pitches and making them into starters.  This approach failed nominally with Aroldis Chapman, but he’s obviously worked out pretty well.  Iglesias, Lorenzen and Howard were all signed in the last 12 months with little to no starting experience and all have the chance to turn into mid-rotation starters.  A fringe benefit of having two athletic, legitimate hitting prospects that are top pitching prospects in an NL organization is that they should be above average hitters (among pitchers) if they become big league starters.

After trades to acquire Mat Latos, Sean Marshall, Jonathan Broxton and Shin-Soo Choo depleted the system, Reds execs feel like the cupboard is full once again, with much of the top minor league talent in the upper levels.  Due to this and a big group of experienced 20-something big league contributors (Devin Mesoraco, Jay Bruce, Homer Bailey, Todd Frazier, Mike Leake, Chapman, Latos), the MLB growth assets list is shorter than most and includes an interesting case in Negron.

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Evaluating the Prospects: Rangers, Rockies, Diamondbacks, Twins, Astros, Red Sox, Cubs, White Sox & Reds

Scouting Explained: Introduction, Hitting Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 Pt 6

The White Sox system is better than in recent years, definitely helped by the addition of 2014 #3 overall pick LHP Carlos Rodon, only the White Sox second top 10 overall pick since 1990.  The White Sox mixed drafting history has ticked up recently, with their top two picks in their last two drafts (Rodon, Adams, Anderson, Danish) all showing up on this list with 50+ FVs (no small feat), joined by a power arm acquired from the Red Sox in one of the few White Sox dump trades in recent years.

Chicago’s system isn’t exceptionally deep, but recent solid drafts and an increased presence in Latin America have helped the system, along with an increased focus on young players.  Jose Abreu, Chris Sale, Adam Eaton and Jose Quintana didn’t qualify for the MLB growth assets list, but that’s two stars and two above average everyday players, all in their control years that were acquired for below market prices.  Combine that with an improved farm, the upper tier of which is mostly at the upper levels, and that gives White Sox fans some hope that, with another step forward from the big league team, success could be sustained for awhile.

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