Making Sense of Ozhaino Albies’ Awesome Pro Debut

Lead prospect analyst Kiley McDaniel turned some heads when he ranked Ozhaino Albies — a 5-foot-9, 17-year-old shortstop — as the top prospect in the Atlanta Braves minor league system. Albies was on the prospect radar prior to Kiley’s ranking, but slotted much lower on most organizational prospect lists this winter. Keith Law, John Sickels, Baseball America, and Baseball Prospectus ranked him 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th respectively. Here’s what Kiley had to say about Albies and his ranking.

Some scouts are already throwing 60’s on Albies hit tool after a huge pro debut, where he hit .364/.446/.444 in 239 plate appearances over two Rookie ball levels with 22 stolen bases and more walks than strikeouts. He continued his assault by impressing the more heavily-scouted instructional league and every scout that has seen him told me they can’t argue with this ranking.

Power isn’t a big part of game and likely will never be, but he does everything else so well at such a young age, that no one seems to care. He has excellent feel for the stike zone and the bat head, plenty of bat speed, knowledge of when to use his gap power and when to keep the ball on the ground, along with easy plus speed and plus everything on the defensive side, enough to comfortably project to stay at the position.  There has to be universal praise for me to go this high on a guy this young and this small that I’ve never seen before, but I think I’ll have him first on this list next year, so I feel fine getting ahead of the crowd now.

Kiley’s definitely the high guy on Albies right now, but KATOH — my prospect projection system — might be even higher. Setting the minimum to 200 plate appearances, the KATOH leaderboard for hitters based on the 2014 season reads thusly.

Rank	Name	2014 High Level	WAR thru 28
1	Mookie Betts	MLB	21.6
2	Joc Pederson	MLB	18.3
3	Jose Ramirez	MLB	16.3
4	Kris Bryant	AAA	16.0
5	Jorge Soler	MLB	15.6
6	Gregory Polanco	MLB	14.6
7	Addison Russell	AA	13.1
8	Arismendy Alcantara	MLB	12.3
9	Jon Singleton	MLB	11.7
10	Joey Gallo	AA	11.0
11	Alex Verdugo	R	10.8
12	Ozhaino Albies	R	10.6

Most of the players listed above were excellent hitters in Double- or Triple-A last year. If they haven’t already graduated to the big leagues, they’re knocking on the door. But in the #11 and #12 spots, you see Alex Verdugo and Ozhaino Albies: a couple of teenagers who have yet to play above Rookie ball. Verdugo’s an intriguing prospect in his own right, but let’s focus on Albies, who’s gotten a good deal more love in prospect circles this winter.

It’s not hard to see why a stats-based projection would be all over Albies. His .364/.445/.447 batting line was one of the most eye-popping in all of organized baseball last year, and it came against pitchers who were often two or three years his senior. Players who are among the best and the youngest hitters in their league often go on to do good things in the majors.

KATOH’s evaluation of Albies is encouraging, but it doesn’t come without risk. His projection is more than a little top heavy, giving him a healthy 34% chance of accumulating at least 16 WAR through age 28, but a 20% chance of never playing in a single game. Such is the nature of trying to forecast players players buried deep in the low minors. Here’s a look at Albies’ full breakout from KATOH.

MLB	>4 WAR	>6 WAR	>8 WAR	>10 WAR	>12 WAR	>16 WAR
80%	53%	52%	44%	37%	36%	34%

To help better personify the range of possible outcomes for Albies, let’s take a gander at what became of past players who turned in seasons similar to his 2014 campaign. K%, ISO, BABIP and frequency of stolen base attempts are the stats that best predict success for players in Rookie ball, so I used these metrics to set some filters. Note that a hitter’s walk rate wasn’t taken into account since my research found it to be unpredictive of future success for players below full-season ball. Below, you’ll find the complete list of 17-year-old in Rookie ballers from 1990 through 2008 who fell within one standard deviation of each of Albies’ league-adjusted numbers.

Year	Name	Position	Age	BB%	K%	ISO	BABIP	SBA%	WAR thru 28	MLB Games	WAR/ 150 G
1999	Carl Crawford	RF	17	4%	16%	.065	.371	19%	35.7	1,235	4.3
1992	Richard Hidalgo	OF	17	6%	15%	.123	.376	21%	20	755	4.0
1991	Manny Cora	SS	17	4%	16%	.116	.380	15%	0.0	0.0	0.0
2014	Ozhaino Albies	SS	17	12%	10%	.089	.407	25%	?	?	?

That’s an exciting list of names, but there’s also only three of them. There simply haven’t been too many seasons that looked like Albies’ 2014 campaign. Let’s expand the pool by including 18-year-olds who met my original criteria, and 17-year-olds who fell within 1.5 standard deviations of Albies’ numbers.

Year	Name	Position	Age	BB%	K%	ISO	BABIP	SBA%	WAR thru 28	MLB Games	WAR/ 150 G
1991	Bobby Abreu	OF	17	8%	15%	.109	.364	11%	30.7	850	5.4
2000	Grady Sizemore	CF	17	9%	12%	.099	.341	21%	29.3	892	4.9
1999	Carl Crawford	RF	17	4%	16%	.065	.371	19%	35.7	1,235	4.3
1992	Richard Hidalgo	OF	17	6%	15%	.123	.376	21%	20.0	755	4.0
2002	Erick Aybar	SS	18	6%	15%	.132	.360	17%	13.3	770	2.6
1992	Jose Vidro	2B	17	7%	16%	.146	.395	12%	14.3	863	2.5
2000	Alejandro Machado	2B	18	18%	11%	.035	.391	21%	0.1	10	1.5
2001	Ronny Cedeno	SS	18	7%	15%	.127	.391	24%	0.0	701	0.0
2002	Alex Romero	CF	18	12%	9%	.144	.360	19%	0.0	144	0.0
1994	Carlos Hernandez	SS	18	8%	12%	.087	.387	31%	0.0	18	0.0
1990	Omar Garcia	1B	18	9%	15%	.141	.373	16%	0.0	0	0.0
1991	Manny Cora	SS	17	4%	16%	.116	.380	15%	0.0	0	0.0
1994	Oscar Robles	SS	18	15%	10%	.067	.389	15%	0.0	0	0.0
1995	Nelson Samboy	2B	18	11%	10%	.121	.368	26%	0.0	0	0.0
1998	Rolando Garza	SS	18	7%	14%	.117	.386	17%	0.0	0	0.0
1999	Juan Ventura	2B	18	5%	12%	.085	.420	30%	0.0	0	0.0
2001	Carlos Duran	CF	18	6%	14%	.127	.364	23%	0.0	0	0.0
2001	Ozzie Chavez	SS	17	7%	17%	.125	.347	15%	0.0	0	0.0
2014	Ozhaino Albies	SS	17	12%	10%	.089	.407	25%	?	?	?
	Group Average		18	9%	13%	.108	.377	20%	8.0	347	1.4

This wider net catches a total of 19 players, who averaged 8 WAR through age 28. If we limit this analysis to just the 17-year-olds, this average jumps up to 18.6 WAR. Five of the seven seventeen-year-olds who had seasons similar to Albies’ went on to do very good things.

In fairness, not all of these players look all that much like Albies. Abreu, Sizemore and Hidalgo were all tall, power-hitting outfielders. Albies, on the other hand, is listed at 5-foot-9, and hit 62% of his batted balls on the ground last year. Yet even if you cast the hulking outfielders aside, you still have Erick Aybar and Jose Vidro to dream on. Both were middle infielders who went on to have productive careers despite never hitting for a ton of power. Regardless of how you slice the data, players who do things similar to what Albies did last season have a habit of turning into quality hitters. Considering how often prospects fail, especially ones that are still years away from the majors, this is a good sign.

Rookie ball stats mean very little. The sample sizes are tiny and the competition only faintly resembles what a player will see in the majors. But Albies’ performance last year was about as good as it gets, and the tools suggest it wasn’t a fluke. The driving force behind Albies’ projection was his 10% strikeout rate, which illustrates his ability to make consistent contact. Pair that with excellent speed and solid defensive skills, and you have a pretty exciting prospect on your hands.

Albies pro debut was more than a little encouraging, but 2015 will be the real test of his skills. Full season ball is what separates the men from the boys, and Albies’ performance in the South Atlantic League will give us a better idea of just how good he’ll eventually become.