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The SEC opened conference play this past weekend and there were a bunch of great matchups. The most surprising result was Tennessee’s sweep of Florida, as both teams entered the series ranked in the top 10. At this point, the Volunteers look like the best team in college baseball. Outside of the SEC, Stanford’s Japanese phenom Rintaro Sasaki hit his first career home run on Saturday, and we saw a four-homer day from Northwestern’s Trent Liolios.

Sticking to the theme of last week, these notes are on draft-eligible players who are not currently listed on The Board, as it’s still too early to rank them, but who nonetheless should hear their names called this July. Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. This is the fifth year we’re delineating between two anticipated relief roles, the abbreviations for which you’ll see in the “position” column below: MIRP for multi-inning relief pitchers, and SIRP for single-inning relief pitchers. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb.

A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.

All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every team’s list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. It can be found here. Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Detroit Tigers. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as our own observations. This is the fifth year we’re delineating between two anticipated relief roles, the abbreviations for which you’ll see in the “position” column below: MIRP for multi-inning relief pitchers, and SIRP for single-inning relief pitchers. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb.

A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.

All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every team’s list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. It can be found here. Read the rest of this entry »

We’re a month into the college season, and while it’s too early to make definitive statements about players, enough time has passed for a few to begin setting themselves apart from their peers. As we head into conference play, I wanted to highlight a few guys who weren’t listed on The Board when we launched our initial rankings during Prospect Week, but who have stood out in the early going. One has been added to The Board, while the others might find their way there before Day One rolls around.

Liam Doyle, LHP, Tennessee
Weekend Line: 5.2 IP, 13 K, 2 BB, 0.00 ERA vs. St. Bonaventure

Liam Doyle stormed onto the scene to start the year and is looking like one of the top pitching prospects in the entire class. He’s had a nomadic career so far, spending his freshman year at Coastal Carolina before transferring Ole Miss as a sophomore. Now the Friday night guy at Tennessee, he’s made four starts, posting a 0.44 ERA with a 61.8% K-BB%, highest amongst qualified D-I pitchers.

What makes Doyle special is his fastball, which sits in the mid-90s, tops out at 99 mph, and boasts a unique movement profile. He routinely gets over 20 inches of vertical break on it to go with 13 inches of horizontal break, and he generates a shallow approach angle that helps it play up even more. For a variety of reasons, college pitch metrics tend to overstate the amount of movement a pitch will have once a player gets into affiliated ball, but it’s one of the best fastballs in college baseball. Read the rest of this entry »

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Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Atlanta Braves. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. This is the fifth year we’re delineating between two anticipated relief roles, the abbreviations for which you’ll see in the “position” column below: MIRP for multi-inning relief pitchers, and SIRP for single-inning relief pitchers. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb.

A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.

All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every team’s list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. It can be found here. Read the rest of this entry »

When David Appelman announced on Monday that we were adding college stats to our player pages and leaderboards, more than one person reached out to congratulate me personally. I had nothing to do with the conception or implementation of this blessed happening, but it is true: FanGraphs having college stats could not be more up my alley.

I wanted to play around with the new leaderboard, but this early in the season, there’s little to be gleaned. No pitcher has made more than four starts; no team has played more than 14 games. And most of the action we’ve seen so far has been nonconference throat-clearing, mismatches between blue bloods and mid-majors. The numbers will tell, but not for another few weeks.

So I decided to go back to the roots of the sabermetrics movement. Our college leaderboards might not have all the latest fancy Statcast stuff, but we’ve got FIP and K% and all sorts of things you wouldn’t take for granted if you’ve ever had to calculate a pitcher’s WHIP by hand on the back of a box score in a MAC press box. When we got all that stuff in the pro game, what did we do with it?

That’s right, relitigate award voting. Read the rest of this entry »

There is more to Zebby Matthews’ game than an elite strike-throwing ability, though he certainly possesses that. As our lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen put it last summer, the 24-year-old Minnesota Twins right-hander “has barely walked anyone the last half decade.” That wasn’t an exaggeration. Matthews issued one free pass every nine innings as a collegian, and his walk rate over 205 1/3 minor league frames is a Lilliputian 2.7%. Called up to the big leagues last August, he proceeded to walk just 11 batters in 37 2/3 frames. That works out to 2.63 batters per nine innings, or nearly two more walks per nine than he had in the minors last year, but don’t get too hung up on the small-sample spike.

Besides, as I mentioned up top, there is more to Matthews than what has garnered him the most attention. Displaying better stuff than many give him credit for — his heater sits comfortably in the mid-90s — the 2022 eighth-round pick out of Western Carolina University logged a 30.5% strikeout rate last year in the minors, and in the majors that number was 27.8%. Still rookie eligible and with a chance to break camp in the Twins’ starting rotation, Matthews is the organization’s top pitching prospect.

Matthews discussed the development of his underrated arsenal prior to a recent spring training game.

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David Laurila: Let’s start with your pitches. What is your full repertoire?

Zebby Matthews: “I have a four-seam fastball that has some decent carry on it, a cutter, a gyro slider, a curveball, and a changeup.”

Laurila: How much carry do you get on your fastball? Read the rest of this entry »

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