Eric Longenhagen Prospects Chat: 12/12/25

Eric A Longenhagen: Good morning from Tempe, happy to be home and back with you, let’s get to it…

RS: Not a Giants fan, but I’m surprised Josuar Gonzalez isn’t considered a top 10 prospect. His batted ball metrics are impressive and the reports on his defense are even more impressive. Is it a proximity thing?

Eric A Longenhagen: The proximity and time-to-maturation pieces of it matter, yeah, and with that comes an added degree of uncertainty. Josuar is so young that aspects of how he’s going to develop athletically and bodily are also more difficult to project at this time…

Eric A Longenhagen: For instance, there was a point where Starlyn Caba’s report was, “Elite defender, elite contact rate (like 90%) DSL SS.”

Eric A Longenhagen: I like Caba, but he’s developed as an athlete in such a way (he’s remained like 5-foot-9, he’s a smaller guy) that limits his ceiling. SOmething like that *could* still happen to Josuar.

Eric A Longenhagen: But there’s also the outcome where he develops, physically, like Lindor. That Josuar even has that kind of ceiling is a special thing in the prospect space, even if it isn’t the likeliest outcome.

Eric A Longenhagen: That sort of right tail demands prioritization but idk if I think it’s up at 10.

Eric A Longenhagen: like 30? Still pretty aggressive but reasonable.

The Fifth Rule: If you had to take one rule-5 eligible position player, who would it have been?

Eric A Longenhagen: It would depend on what the roster needs, but in a vacuum, I like Cameron Cauley.

Eric A Longenhagen: Like two guys I’d have taken if I were a team strictly browsing the untaken guys for ceiling: Cam Cauley, Allen Facundo

Eric A Longenhagen: I think the same risks that apply to Spencer Miles (who I like a lot) apply to Facundo.

ABS before leg day: Any additional info on Miguel Caraballo beyond the short blurb in the Rule 5 piece?

Eric A Longenhagen: No, film work on the DSL guys always requires more time than is worth it when I’m just working on an individual target. We’ll update his report in full when we do the Twins list.

Max: Thoughts on Kendry Chourio and David Shields on the Royals? Any chance they jump onto a top 100 prospect list in the next year?

Eric A Longenhagen: Chourio has a live arm and creates real action on both of his secondary pitches. It’s like 94-97 with plus curveball and changeup. His delivery is pretty violent and he’s on the smaller side, an even six feet or so. I’m more inclined to 45+ a guy with this degree of risk, he threw 51 innings.

Eric A Longenhagen: He’s really exciting, just wanna see the stamina piece demonstrated before I slide him ahead of the Parker Messick types who have proven it and are right there.

Eric A Longenhagen: Shields I’m not on as much, I have a harder time seeing ceiling and think he’s more like a low variance backend starter type. I get it, he can pitch, the fastball has punched above its weight, I’m not sure he’ll have the secondary pitch quality of a Jose Quintana or anything like that.

Jonathan: What are the first things you look at when observing/analyzing a prospect for the first time?

Eric A Longenhagen: It just depends on how it is I first interact with them. Sometimes the first thing I’ve looked at is the number of innings they’ve pitched because that’s what I sorted on the minor league leaderboard. Sometimes it’s a different sort of data point like their extension, sometimes I’m introduced to a player when the PA announcer says the guy’s name as he steps up to take BP at a showcase.

Eli: Lot of angst about the Yankees not trading Spencer Jones during his hot streak but presume that all the consensus concerns about his hit/K rates around the league haven’t abated at all?

Eric A Longenhagen: I think teams have properly evaluated and valued him, and that the internet zeitgeist has probably not.

Chooch: Curet, haven’t seen a ton of talk on this little trade with the phillies. Any insight on where he is at right now?

Eric A Longenhagen: His delivery looked out of whack to me when he came back. It might take someone who is better at articulating the biomechanics of it to explain why, his arm action and power through release just seemed less comfortable and authoritative to me…

Eric A Longenhagen: I really liked this guy, but here’s a counter example to my Chourio screed: Curet is someone who, at least during the last ten months or so, the track record of stamina and performance was there but the player still wasn’t a lock to contribute quickly…

Eric A Longenhagen: Remember there was a multi-year period across which Curet led the entire minor leagues in K’s.

Guest: Did Yoniel Curet really go that much backwards last year that he deserved to be DFA’d?

Eric A Longenhagen: Some of it is more about the Rays feeling like they don’t have the time or roster space to dick around with. This guy could get right, lots of pitchers go through this, but he didn’t look like a rosterable guy at the end of the season.

mmddyyyy: How do you take your caffeine?

Eric A Longenhagen: Just coffee

Eric A Longenhagen: My mom 60-year-old mom handed me a Celsius last week and either assumed I knew what it was (which I did, even though I’ve never tried one) or didn’t feel the need to tell me that it’s caffeinated, or doesn’t herself know that it is.

Eric A Longenhagen: I think it was the first one.

Eric A Longenhagen: RIght?

Draft Man: How does the top of this draft class compare to last year’s?

Eric A Longenhagen: I feel like the top tier is two or three players deep. I bet a couple pitchers emerge in the spring and will join them. Probably a little shallower right now than average.

Christina: With Alonso out of NY, does open the door for Ryan Clifford? Could he be in play for their opening day 1B?

Eric A Longenhagen: I think he’s in the medium term mix. I think they have so many on-roster options right now (permutations with Vientos at 1B, or maybe a Ketel trade or something at 2B and Semien moves to 1B {just spitballing}) that they’ll like set sail on 2026 with Clifford in the minors…

Eric A Longenhagen: But if he crushes during Spring Training and is crushing when the calendar turns May while, i dunno, Vientos is slumping or something, that is when he might get an opportunity.

Scott: I’m curious about how guys like Isaac Lyon get included in trades. Who brings him up in the conversation? Does the acquiring team actually think he’s a fringe prospect? Was he on anyone’s radar as anything more than roster filler? Is he now? It’s hard for me to understand valuations so precise that a team would believe that Ferrer for Ford is almost fair, but need a guy like this to even it out.

Eric A Longenhagen: I know there are folks with clubs who have coveted Ferrer. I was not on him to *that* degree, and had him more as a lefty middle inning option.

Eric A Longenhagen: It’s possible Ford just doesn’t hit.

Eric A Longenhagen: But to your question… I don’t know who the decision makers there came to want Lyon. It’s possible someone liked him during the course of their 2025 travels working for their old team. He’s a pitchability guy with good secondary stuff, we like him. Maybe the strategy was to take a player who was recently drafted to maximize their time in the org and the area scout or crosschecker might have liked him.

Padilla: Yairo Padilla’s physical projection looks great. But I am concerned about the GB%. Are there any successful examples of guys going from 50% GB in the low minors to valuable power hitters launching fly balls?

Eric A Longenhagen: Yandy Díaz – Stats – Batting | FanGraphs Baseball

mmddyyyy: Where is the center of the baseball world?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’m not sure there’s a good answer to this. The density of baseball humans feels greatest at winter meetings but it feels silly to say WMs when here are so few players there.

Tom: Emmanuel Rodriguez tore up the Dominican Winter League, and should be in early consideration for a debut next season…if he can stay on the field. What caliber prospect do you consider him specifically, and more broadly, how do you go about discounting a player’s physical talents by his actual availability (likewise for other injury-prone guys like DeLauter, Jenkins, Espino, etc)?

Eric A Longenhagen: Honestly with the oft-injured guys I feel like it’s best to take them off the board while you’re lining up everyone else and then just gut-feel place the injured dudes when you’re at the end of the process. Rodriguez feels like Trent Grisham to me, and i’m talking like the entirety of the career arc, not just 2025 Grish.

JD: Rumors that teams asking for Brito in deals and Astros balking.  Would you include him in a deal for a pitcher like Baz?

Eric A Longenhagen: If you think you can make more of Baz, then maybe. If you think Baz is what he is, then no.

Eric A Longenhagen: Baz’s best role, if the cement is dry on him, is in the bullpen, roughly in the same sort of role I expect Brito to occupy

Eric A Longenhagen: Give me more years of Brito

urub: No longer a prospect, but what’s your guess what happens with Dalton Rushing? Isn’t he good enough for a starting job somewhere?

Eric A Longenhagen: He is but that doesn’t mean they have to trade him.

Eric A Longenhagen: It’d probably take a real blockbuster for me to move him.

Green apple: So will Reds Hector Rodriguez be ready for the show in 26? 50 FV ?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’m working on the Reds list right now and am going to make you wait.

ABS before leg day: This is around the time MILB teams do all their hiring for 2026. How hectic was it for you trying to break in with Lehigh Valley?

Eric A Longenhagen: I interviewed in Allentown at the building on Union Blvd just outside the stadium with Lindsey Knupp, who grew up one town over from me and played field hockey at Bloomsburg? Shippensburg? One of those. She works for the Trash Pandas now. I did not see her at the Meetings.

Eric A Longenhagen: I lived nearby and they knew I’d show up. I was the youngest one.

Jonathan: Alec Blair left Oklahoma’s basketball program after one game and plans to focus exclusively on baseball.  Does this at all change how you view him as a prospect with respect to risk?

Eric A Longenhagen: I guess if focusing on baseball allows him to develop more quickly as a hitter, then it will have done that. But I’m not suddenly juicing his grade just because he gave up basketball.

Insert Witty Name Here: WTF is going on with the Iggles? Is Hurts saving his running for the playoffs? Why can’t they find a professional offensive coordinator who knows how to professionally design and call plays?

Eric A Longenhagen: The rest of the apparatus needs to be operating in rarified air if the QB has these throwing limitations. Last year’s O line and Saquon gave them the shot to bust 40+ yarders at any time. That’s not been present this year. Without that they can’t be the best team.

Jonathan: If IBM came to you and said, “Eric, let’s build a custom Large Language Model and for its corpus let’s use every single scouting report you’ve written along with players’ statistics”, do you think you’d discover anything new about either scouting or your own proclivities and how they’ve changed over time?

Eric A Longenhagen: Almost certainly

JT: Anything on the Angels’ Yilver de Paula or the Royals’ Freddy Contreras?

Eric A Longenhagen: De Paula played 10 DSL games and wasn’t at all on my radar until you asked this question, I have nothing. Contreras 94-97 touch an 8, below avg breaking ball spin on an 80-ish mph slurve thing.

Green apple: Does Cam Collier still project as big league regular ?

Eric A Longenhagen: I fell in love with his feel to hit in the AFL.

Redbeard: Not sure how close of attention you pay to guys like Murakami, but is there any hope he get above a 30 grade down the road

Eric A Longenhagen: This is bait, right?

Scotty: Happy Friday, Eric. After doing the Dodgers list… in a vacuum as it stands today, would you trade Hope/Ferris for Michael Busch?

Eric A Longenhagen: At his moment you’d rather have the busch end of the deal in a vacuum

Will: If you were GM for one of the teams with starting pitchers on the block, who would you target from the O’s org?

Eric A Longenhagen: De Leon

Green apple: Have you read the Bloomberg piece from Oct 31 re: parents spending big on youth baseball ? Makes me wonder how many kids from the sports missing

Eric A Longenhagen: I actually didn’t read that so thank you for alerting me of it. Let’s make reading that a group homework assignment for next week.

sliderguy35: we know a lot on the publiv side about how pitchers with lower spin efficiencies and higher spin capacity usually have more avenues to expand their pitch mix later on. Is this something you think is going to become more prevalent in scouting discussion around pitchers moving forward?

Eric A Longenhagen: I think what I’m more apt to argue for is that difference-making characteristics of any kind should be more present in discussions rather than any one trait. Let’s turn over rocks looking for guys who do stuff at a 7 or 8 level, no matter what measurable trait we’re looking for.

GB: Why is latavius murray playing sandlot football?

Eric A Longenhagen: I accidentally gave him a flat tire in the Signia bar/lobby area. I didn’t realize until later that it was him. He is part owner of this company, which was one of the vendors there. Enduraphin® | Ready To Mix Performance Nutrition

Eric A Longenhagen: Latavius Murray Stats, Height, Weight, Position, Draft, College | Pro-Football-Reference.com

Eric A Longenhagen: Who’s the baseball player comp for Latavius?

Eric A Longenhagen: Super long career, more of a productive platoon back who’d pop off in individual games on occasion, super tall guy for his position, mercenary at the end.

Kate: Not a prospect anymore, but what is your read on Jordan Beck at this point?  Can the hit tool hold and let the other tools shine through or was his second half a better representation of what’s to come (i.e. pitchers figuring him out)?

Eric A Longenhagen: I was pretty skeptical of Beck as a prospect and though his surface stats in 2025 were pretty good for a guy getting his first healthy, extended run, I’m still in that camp

Rob: How soon do you think we could see Liam Doyle in MLB? Disregarding secondary considerations like years of control, how close is he to being an average or back-end MLB SP?

Eric A Longenhagen: I feel like in a different org he’d be a threat to Yesavage in 2026. But if the Cardinals are on a more of two-year contention plan there’s no reason to rush him like that.

Sir Nerdlington: With the Pavia case likely to become a class action suit and the NCAA not winning a court case since 1847, what chance do high schoolers have of playing college ball they’re going to against 27 year old college kids in their 7 season?

Eric A Longenhagen: Two questions that arise for me immediately: Does MLB try to facilitate a similar trend in college baseball so that it can function as a de facto minor league system at no cost to the owners? What knock-on effects might the NFL feel if players incentives become to remain in college for longer?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’m way over time but there are a lot of you in here today so I’m gonna stick around for a few more minutes and try to rapid fire some answers.

Chase: Looking for things to be excited about as a Halos fan, is the breakout from Raudi Rodriguez legit or just someone to keep an eye on next summer? Tore up the AFL, too.

Eric A Longenhagen: Yes. Plus bat speed, plus footspeed. Really toolsy guy, risky but fun.

Tacoby Bellsbury: Were you surprised when only one position player was taken in the Rule V draft, or is that just the logical progression now?

Eric A Longenhagen: Not really. The Rule 5 is so much about roster fit, the value of a spot, risk tolerance, and asymmetry of thought, not so much about talent.

Key Jangler: Best part of living in Arizona besides the baseball?

Eric A Longenhagen: Eating here

Salty: Hey Eric – has Morabito’s stock risen in your mind, or are you still concerned enough with his in-zone contact that 4th OF/bench speed threat is his best outcome?

Eric A Longenhagen: Stock up. 70 runner, plus defender in CF. Has real roster utility. Started pulling the ball late in AFL. Real change? Or just bias on look against bad pitching? Stay tuned.

OwenB: Thank you for all your great work!  Incredibly helpful in my dynasty league!  Question: why aren’t scouts higher on Mikey Romero?  Good EV and LA, plays IF.  K rate spiked in upper levels but at his age seems normal.  Do you see a 50FV/MLB regular in his future?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’m skeptical, super chase prone, below avg athlete. Swings hard but I have a hard time seeing him as a 50

Cromulent: Is there going to be a moment when we can say the elimination of short-season killed player X’s development or will it always be too multifactorial to pin it on that?

Eric A Longenhagen: A scout told me to look at the demographic of players who have actually made it to the upper minors the last five years and that we might see what is lost as a result of their elimination.

What even IS APBA: Rebuilding in a APBA dynasty replay keeper league where you cut to 25 players before the draft, should I trade JJ Wetherholt for Eury Perez? My infield post-cut will be G.Perdomo, S.Stewart, J.Westburg, C.Keith, K.Campbell, M.Mayer, J.Made. My post-cut rotation is H.Brown, R.Olson, B.Chandler, C.Burns. I am leaning towards making the deal since I’m hurting for SPs, but I hesitate as Perez’s arm could fall off (again!!) any time and Wetherholt could be playing for ten to fifteen years… Looking at other dynasty rankings it seems like the consensus is Perez, but would love your insight based on my team comp. THANK YOU!!!

Eric A Longenhagen: I’d want Eury

Guest: Please rank the following in terms of long term potential: McLean, Sasaki, Burns, Horton, Schlitter.  Thanks!

Eric A Longenhagen: Flip Cam and Cade and they’re basically in the right order for me right now. You could flip Burns and Roki if you want, they’re basically the same for me.

Will: What sample size makes you feel confident when evaluating a prospect?

Eric A Longenhagen: Depends on the stat you’re talking about. Changes in mechanics or body composition might be meaningful right away.

Aroon Werewolves of London: Is there any chance Escobar turns into a Bryson Stott replacement?

Eric A Longenhagen: Yes

Bret: Did Tyler Bremner pitch at all after being drafted? Any word on how he looked? I know there was some thinking that the off-field things he was dealing with last year may have been impacted him negatively and he’d be due to improve.

Eric A Longenhagen: I don’t think Bremner threw but I’d wanna double check with Bill Mitchell on that. The off-field situation you’re referring to was his mother’s death, in case folks don’t know. He’s really good.

Guest: when is the international list for IFAs going to get a tweak

Eric A Longenhagen: Jan 5th ish

Mariner Fan: Do you have an in-person or video-derived impression on Ryan Sloan yet? Looking forward to watching him at Everett (A+) this year, and wondering how fast he might move.

Eric A Longenhagen: Saw him during the spring, and then again on tape during work on SEA list. Was overwhelmed by the spotlight of the breakout game but clearly has real sh*t. Three potential plus pitches, go see him when you can.

Eric A Longenhagen: Okay now I do have to split. Thanks for hanging out, be back here next Friday for the last pre-Christmas break chat.