Eric Longenhagen Prospects Chat: 1/16/26

Eric A Longenhagen: Hey there, folks. Good morning from the kitchen island in Tempe, I’m stoked to see some guys throw bullpens and take BP today. First day of school feeling and all that.

Eric A Longenhagen: I’ve got a hard out at 11 (I have a radio hit to do and then wanna hustle to Diablo for the Dream Series workouts) so let’s get rolling.

Jim: Where does Colome rank among A’s prospects?

Eric A Longenhagen: Probably 4th or 5th

Eric A Longenhagen: I’ll take Jump and Morales over him for sure, maybe Barnett belongs with those guys. Arnold v Colome or maybe something like Montero v Colome are good questions tbd

go cards: what do you make of joshua baez’s contact improvements in 2025? outside chance at him being stuffed for 2026?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’m pretty skeptical. Definitely an “arrow up” guy who made changes that have worked for him, he has substantial raw power, but his stiffness and the look of his swing… just doesn’t pass the visual smell test to me.

Scotty: Read that Alejandro Rosario just had TJS this month… sad to see. Did you ever get any more info about what caused his surgery timeline to keep getting pushed back?

Eric A Longenhagen: He had a separate medical issue that required attention and recovery before he could have the TJ

Rays: Who is this Clarke guy we just got?

Eric A Longenhagen: Fifth rounder out of Harvard, low-90s/sweeper guy with a really good looking arm action, changeup looked like it was getting better late in 2024 and, turns out, it was. It played like a plus pitch in ’25. He had success as a starter and reached Double-A….

Eric A Longenhagen: His fastball plays down a bit, and his command is a little south of average, but this guy was on a 2027 debut trajectory already, and now joins an org that’s recently better at developing guys than LAA.

PinstripedPride: Jasson Dominguez was a highly ranked prospect but had an up and down rookie year. Are you more down on him now? Do you think the power will come?

Eric A Longenhagen: He *has* power, it’s just about whether he hits enough to get to all of it. He was graduated as a 50-grade prospect here and that’s still what I tend to think he’ll be, plus-power LF with below average defense, average LF overall.

Se Acabo!: Any shot I can get any Juan Cabada thoughts before the Cubs list? Seems like lots to like

Eric A Longenhagen: I heard through the Arizona Phil grapevine that the Cubs have a group in AZ already for minicamp, and he’s one of them. So maybe in a week or two when I’ve snooped around there I’ll have more complete thoughts. He’s a nice prospect.

Insert Witty Name Here: Any interest in the Eagles OC position?

Insert Witty Name Here: What kind of prospect could the Phils get for Bohm?  Anyone worthwhile or lotto tickets just to dump the salary?

Eric A Longenhagen: Eagles OC thoughts: The head coach and GM there have done an objectively good job, and also a thing they can’t get right despite many attempts is hiring the right OC.

Eric A Longenhagen: I like Bohm. I wouldn’t trade him. Don’t get fatigued with that guy, think about Yandy Diaz and his career. Give me a guy making like 90% zone contact who has Bohm’s long term athletic projection. He’s gonna be a 10mil arb guy, even if he’s just a 1.7sh WAR guy again, that’s a bargain. I think he has real trade value, not just a guy where the salary cripples your return. Our projections have him as a 2 WAR player in ’26 and I’m inclined to agree.

Guest: Can you pass along some potential sleepers to watch for in the Jays system?

Eric A Longenhagen: We think Victor Arias has real tools, I think a healthy TJ Brock could be a good 7th/8th inning type, we like Elaineiker Coronado some as a deep sleeper.

drplantwrench: i wanna talk about the biggest news of yesterday: what do you think of the angels getting Josh Lowe?  and do you think this affects Rada being called up this year?

Eric A Longenhagen: I think Lowe mashes righties well enough to be an effective platoon piece. He adds to their overall depth and compliments a righty-heavy Trout/Soler/Adell group pretty nicely…

Eric A Longenhagen: Rada might come up in September just to have a look at him. He has to be put on the 40 after the season, he could come up in late August  Sept and get his feet wet without burning an option.

Mookie: Hey Eric, how would you line up the Red Sox starting rotation with the Suarez signing? Do you think odds are very high one of Payton Tolle or Connelly Early gets traded now for infield help? Thanks!

Eric A Longenhagen: Crochet
Sonny
Ranger
Bello
Tolle/Early/Harrison spring competition…

Eric A Longenhagen: I do think, if I’m them, I’d be looking to trade from my pitching depth to acquire an infielder. I still think they’re a natural fit for Ketel (who I don’t want the D’Backs to trade) but if I’m AZ in that case I’m tryna build a package around Bello and a Kristian Campbell buy low and Early, like I’m trading an MVP candidate so you had better blow me away

Eric A Longenhagen: I like Early more than Tolle now, I think. Tolle’s breaking ball quality limits his ceiling, Early a more fluid athlete…

NFP: do you still see Kiefer Lord having a 60/70 FB? he came back last season still sitting 94-95 with relatively little dev time

Eric A Longenhagen: (yah yah)

Eric A Longenhagen: I have 94-96 scraped 98, 6ft6 extension, 77 inch release height, 10% swinging strike rate on 74 pitches.

Eric A Longenhagen: too small a sample to really trust the SwngStr% but that’s average for a FB

Eric A Longenhagen: so more like 50 right now and let’s watch the tape to see how the super tall dev project looks as an athlete. Ideally wanna see more extension on a guy that big as evidence of the athlete.

Potato: I am both philosophically fine with the Dodgers signing Tucker, and also think it’s bad for baseball. Sigh.

Eric A Longenhagen: I am more or less in you camp and fear the direction discourse will take as it pertains to the salary cap.

Se Acabo!: Liam Peterson seems the most physically talented RHP in this draft. Massive, mobile, long track record, healthy, tremendous arm strength, variety, power, spin…Top 5 pick or do Cubs have hope in the teens? Is it a matter of strikes this Spring?

Eric A Longenhagen: Betcha he goes top 10

Dodgers Again?: What are yor thoughts on Sasaki after he pitched effectively out of the bullpen? Do you think he’ll be a viable mid-rotation piece?

Eric A Longenhagen: You see where the command is this spring, but that guy looked like a reliever last year.

brad lipton: Is there a chart or table that gives some measure of career (or first 5 years) of MLB production based (e.g., WAR) on FV upon initial callup to MLB?  I am thinking about this in relation to how to value a 40 FV player relative to 45 FV or 50 FV.  Does three or four 40 FV players approximate a 50 FV player value (from a statistical standpoint)?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’m a little confused by the wording of your first question but I think I see what you’re getting at and the answer is yes.

Eric A Longenhagen: There have been a lot of tutorials posts and updates to the “FV means we expect this many WAR, or this kind of role on a roster” canon.

Eric A Longenhagen: The very first google result when searching is this one: The New FanGraphs Scouting Primer | FanGraphs Baseball

Eric A Longenhagen: You can look at any given position’s leaderboard over 5-6 years and see the talent curve across the WAR distribution: Major League Leaderboards – 2020 to 2025 – Batting | FanGraphs Baseball

Eric A Longenhagen: Or do your own WAR per 600 PA calc and see it that way.

Eric A Longenhagen: To your second question:

Eric A Longenhagen: Craig Edwards research was that the players who can be starts and stick around for a while are many times more valuable than the 40-grade role players who come and go before they’re deep into arb. You can see the valuations by FV tier on the Farm System ranking page: Farm System Rankings | FanGraphs Baseball

JC: Hi Eric, first time long time. Enjoyed the most recent international articles and ranking. My question: With these players agreeing to handshake deals earlier and earlier in age, I’m curious who has been the biggest gap in Signing Bonus to Actual Talent on signing day in your opinion?

Eric A Longenhagen: Throughout the process I’d have told you it was Jeancer Custodio, but he signed for much less than the info I had indicated he would. The real right answer is probably that one of the 3+ million dollar guys isn’t going to hit at all.  and we’ll find out who that is over the next twelve months. My answer sitting here now is that the trajectory of Gregory Pio’s scouting reports and Yeison Horton’s lack of projection are kinda scary?

Eric A Longenhagen: On the flip side I love Randy Santana

Jonathan: Do you think the biggest hurdle keeping people from accurately projecting 14-year-old DR kids’ frames at maturity is the relative lack of information about diet, prior weight training, family athleticism, etc.?  If you wanted to create a model to predict how bodies fill out, what data would you include besides age, height, weight, shoulder width, leg length, whatever else scouts typically use to determine projectability?

Eric A Longenhagen: I think it’s literally everything about them at that young of an age

Eric A Longenhagen: And who would want to be tracking that kind of stuff that early? It’s macabre to me. There are teams who aren’t down for that sh*t and just don’t participate in that segment of the talent pool.

Eric A Longenhagen: The thing that is positive about the current international system, in my opinion, is that the players have agency to choose their team in a way the draft doesn’t allow. But if you’re deciding at 13, can we even call that a choice? Could 13 year old me be anything other than coerced?

Eric A Longenhagen: Okay, I’m gonna do this radio hit on MLB Network SiriusXM now

Eric A Longenhagen: and then go watch bullpens.

Eric A Longenhagen: Oh! Brendan is gonna start his own chat in the near future. So you’ll have double the prospect chat.

Eric A Longenhagen: See y’all next Friday, same Bat time same bat channel