Prospect writers Kevin Goldstein and Eric Longenhagen will sometimes have enough player notes to compile a scouting post. This is one of those dispatches, a collection of thoughts after another weekend of college baseball, minor league spring training, and big league action. Remember, prospect rankings can be found on The Board.

Editor’s Note: This piece originally incorrectly stated Cole Winn had had a Tommy John surgery. It has been removed. FanGraphs regrets the error.

Eric’s Notes

Chase Walter, RHP, San Diego Padres

Most of the teams that ended up signing several non-drafted free agents for $20,000 bonuses last year were the ones with thinner farm systems, like the Reds or Nationals. But the Padres inked several as well, and the first one to pop up and look like a real steal, at least for me, is Western Carolina signee Chase Walter. Walter sat 96-98 out of the bullpen in a minor league spring training game late last week. His breaking ball shape varied pretty significantly, looking like a lateral slider sometimes and a power overhand curveball at others. Regardless of its shape, Walter’s breaking ball bent in at 84-87, and the ones that had more of a curveball look to them were plus. He looks like a potential quick-moving relief piece.

Asa Lacy, LHP, Kansas City Royals

Lacy’s first career pro outing against hitters from another org lasted two innings (the second of which was rolled), and was more of a check-in to see where he’s at rather than a look that should alter anyone’s opinion of him. I went into this look knowing that some scouts had seen him throw a live BP about a week and a half earlier and that Lacy was pretty wild during that outing, which is totally fine considering he’s just getting going for the year. He was a little wild in my look, too, and to my eye seemed to have a noticeably lower arm slot while throwing some of his sliders, even during warm-ups.

Lacy came out sitting 94-96 in his first inning of work and then was 95-98 in the second. He doesn’t need to have precise fastball command because his is the sort of fastball that has huge carry and can compete for swings and misses in the zone. Maybe it’s because of the arm slot variation stuff, or because it’s a developmental focus for him, or just because Lacy faced so many right-handed batters, but he ended up throwing many more changeups than anything else during this outing. They were often in the 85-88 mph range and some of them were quite good, while others were not. He broke off a single plus curveball (his curves were about 80-81) that froze a righty hitter and landed in the zone for a strike, while Lacy’s sliders (86-ish) often missed well below the zone but still garnered some awkward swings. Read the rest of this entry »

When the Marlins beat the Mets on April 10th, most of the post-game focus was on Jacob deGrom. The Mets’ ace had pitched a gem: eight innings, five hits, 14 strikeouts, and no walks, with the only run coming on a towering Jazz Chisholm homer in the second inning. And while the indignation on deGrom’s behalf was not unwarranted, it ironically created a smaller, secondary injustice in its wake, obscuring from view the other stellar pitching performance of the day.

Miami’s starter that afternoon was Trevor Rogers, making his second start of the 2021 season. In his outing, he allowed three hits, walked two, and struck out 10 batters over the course of six scoreless innings – a pitching line that undoubtedly would have been the headline story from the game, were it not for deGrom’s dominant, yet unsupported performance.

But being overlooked is nothing new for Rogers. Skepticism has been a running theme in his career since even before he was drafted, when he was an old-for-his-class high schooler (he graduated at 19) in New Mexico, an area of the country that doesn’t always get the same robust coverage of other parts of the Four Corners region. Could scouts really trust the dominant numbers of a player who was so much older than anyone else on the field?

Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Miami Marlins. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. As there was no minor league season in 2020, there are some instances where no new information was gleaned about a player. Players whose write-ups have not been meaningfully altered begin by telling you so. Each blurb ends with an indication of where the player played in 2020, which in turn likely informed the changes to their report if there were any. As always, I’ve leaned more heavily on sources from outside of a given org than those within for reasons of objectivity. Because outside scouts were not allowed at the alternate sites, I’ve primarily focused on data from there, and the context of that data, in my opinion, reduces how meaningful it is. Lastly, in an effort to more clearly indicate relievers’ anticipated roles, you’ll see two reliever designations, both on my lists and on The Board: MIRP, or multi-inning relief pitcher, and SIRP, or single-inning relief pitcher.

For more information on the 20-80 scouting scale by which all of our prospect content is governed, you can click here. For further explanation of Future Value’s merits and drawbacks, read Future Value.

All of the numbered prospects here also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It can be found here.

Nick Yorke was among the more intriguing — some might say confounding — picks in the 2020 amateur draft. Selected 17th overall by Boston out of a San Jose high school, the right-handed-hitting infielder wasn’t expected to go in the first round. Moreover, MLB Pipeline didn’t even rank him as a Top-100 draft prospect. Eyebrows were raised throughout the industry when Yorke’s name was announced on Day One.

Red Sox scouts obviously liked what they saw from the sweet-swinging California prepster. They’re convinced that he’s going to hit, and what they saw this spring only enhanced that belief. Yorke not only impressed during simulated games, he stroked a single off of Atlanta Braves southpaw A.J. Minter in his Grapefruit League debut. As Red Sox right-hander Garrett Richards said after watching him in action, “It made me stop in my tracks a little bit, because I had no idea that this kid was that young.”

Yorke, who celebrated his 19th birthday earlier this month, talked hitting — including his offseason sessions with Seattle Mariners outfielder Mitch Haniger — midway through spring training.

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David Laurila: How would you describe yourself as a hitter?

Nick Yorke: “I see myself as a grinder in the batter’s box. I take every at-bat very seriously. I hate striking out. I hate being beat. And I love hitting. There’s just something about it. You’re having a bad day, so it’s ‘OK, let’s hop in the cage and have some fun.’ I find hitting fun. To think you could change the game with one swing of the bat is exciting to me.”

Laurila: Something I’ve asked a lot of guys over the years is whether they look at hitting as more of an art, or as more of a science. How do you see it?

Yorke: “Ooh, that’s a good question. I see it as more of an art. I think everyone works on their craft, everyone has different feel in the batter’s box, they’re trying to accomplish different things. I mean, I’m not going to go up there and have the same approach as a 6-foot-5, power-hitting lefty first baseman. Everyone has their own thoughts when they’re in the box, so yeah, I would say it’s an art.”

Laurila: A number of hitters have told me “art,” then gone on to talk scientifically about how they approach things… Read the rest of this entry »

Prospect writers Kevin Goldstein and Eric Longenhagen will sometimes have enough player notes to compile a scouting post. This is one of those dispatches, a collection of thoughts after another weekend of college baseball, minor league spring training, and big league action. Remember, prospect rankings can be found on The Board.

Kevin’s Notes

Jonathan Cannon, RHP, Georgia: 7 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 9 K

After throwing 11.2 scoreless innings out of the pen last spring as a freshman for Georgia, Cannon entered the year as a potential late-first round pick this summer, earning draft eligibility as a sophomore due to age. He’s had an up-and-down season, but was at his best over the weekend as he shutdown one of the top teams in the country in Vanderbilt, while throwing 75 of his 111 pitches for strikes. At 6-foot-6 and 215 pounds, Cannon has a classic starting pitcher’s frame to go with an on-line delivery and clean arm action. On the season his stats don’t impress, with a 4.35 ERA and 21 hits allowed in 20 innings, but with just three walks and 24 strikeouts, the numbers indicate an ability to locate, which is exactly what he did against the Commodores.

Cannon has decent velocity, with a fastball that averages 94 mph and touches 97, but his three-quarters arm angle produces less than desirable shape to the heater. His mid-80s slider isn’t a big breaker and his upper-80s changeup has decent fade but is a bit on the firm side. There’s nothing even bordering on nasty in the arsenal, but Cannon can locate any of his pitches in all four quadrants of the strike zone, and knows how to work outside it when looking for a chase. With continued success, he should return to those pre-season late first-round projections, and overall feels like a classic safety-over-upside pick. Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Houston Astros. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. As there was no minor league season in 2020, there are some instances where no new information was gleaned about a player. Players whose write-ups have not been meaningfully altered begin by telling you so. Each blurb ends with an indication of where the player played in 2020, which in turn likely informed the changes to their report if there were any. As always, I’ve leaned more heavily on sources from outside of a given org than those within for reasons of objectivity. Because outside scouts were not allowed at the alternate sites, I’ve primarily focused on data from there, and the context of that data, in my opinion, reduces how meaningful it is. Lastly, in an effort to more clearly indicate relievers’ anticipated roles, you’ll see two reliever designations, both on my lists and on The Board: MIRP, or multi-inning relief pitcher, and SIRP, or single-inning relief pitcher.

For more information on the 20-80 scouting scale by which all of our prospect content is governed, you can click here. For further explanation of Future Value’s merits and drawbacks, read Future Value.

All of the numbered prospects here also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It can be found here.

Join me and Kevin Goldstein this afternoon at 1:00 PM PT/4:00 PM ET for another Prospect Film Session live on the FanGraphs homepage, or our Twitch channel. We’ll be discussing my looks at the unique co-op scrimmages going on in Arizona and the prospects therein, including Jarred Kelenic, Erick Pena, Davis Wendzel, Nick Loftin, the prospects I wrote about here, and more. Read the rest of this entry »

Hunter Brown has helium. Under the radar until recently, the 22-year-old right-hander raised eyebrows during Fall Instructional League, and he continued to do so this spring with the Astros. A power arsenal is the reason why. Houston’s No. 3 prospect according to MLB Pipeline (our own rankings are forthcoming; he was ninth on last year’s list), Brown features a four-pitch mix that includes an explosive mid-90s heater and a hammer curveball.

His background befits the low profile he brought with him to pro ball. A Detroit native, Brown played collegiately at Division II Wayne State University, and he lasted until the penultimate pick of the fifth round of the 2019 draft. That he didn’t hear his name called earlier is yet another part of his underdog story.

Brown — currently at Houston’s alternate site awaiting the start of the minor-league campaign — addressed the path he’s taken, and the plus pitches that promise to take him to the top, shortly before the Astros broke camp to start the major-league season.

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Laurila: You played at Wayne State. How did that come to be?

Hunter Brown: “I had the opportunity to do a little bit of catching, and hopefully pitch, at Eastern Michigan as well. But I was told by coach Ryan Kelley, over at Wayne State, that I’d be able to come in and play as a freshman. I knew I wasn’t going to get that opportunity at Eastern Michigan — I’d probably be catching bullpens and redshirting my freshman year — and I kind of wanted to go somewhere and play right away. I also probably would have gone to Wayne State for academics if I wasn’t going to end up playing college baseball, so it all worked out. I really liked downtown Detroit, so it was a great fit for me.”

Laurila: When did you start realizing you had a legitimate shot to play pro ball?

Brown: “Well, I wanted to play pro ball from as young as I can remember, but probably my sophomore-year summer when I was with the Bethesda Big Train in the Cal Ripken Summer League. That’s when I started really believing, because I played with some guys from the SEC, and power-five schools, and had a pretty good summer. That’s where I thought I made that jump and would be able to play pro ball someday.”

Laurila: What clicked for you? Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the St. Louis Cardinals. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. As there was no minor league season in 2020, there are some instances where no new information was gleaned about a player. Players whose write-ups have not been meaningfully altered begin by telling you so. Each blurb ends with an indication of where the player played in 2020, which in turn likely informed the changes to their report if there were any. As always, I’ve leaned more heavily on sources from outside of a given org than those within for reasons of objectivity. Because outside scouts were not allowed at the alternate sites, I’ve primarily focused on data from there, and the context of that data, in my opinion, reduces how meaningful it is. Lastly, in an effort to more clearly indicate relievers’ anticipated roles, you’ll see two reliever designations, both on my lists and on The Board: MIRP, or multi-inning relief pitcher, and SIRP, or single-inning relief pitcher.

For more information on the 20-80 scouting scale by which all of our prospect content is governed, you can click here. For further explanation of Future Value’s merits and drawbacks, read Future Value.

All of the numbered prospects here also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It can be found here.