Milwaukee Brewers Top 42 Prospects

Chourio, who turns 20 in March, has been among the very best prospects in baseball for the better part of the past 18 months. He turned 19 just before the start of the 2023 season and slashed .280/.336/.467 in 122 games at Double-A Biloxi before the Brewers gave him a six-game shot of espresso at Triple-A Nashville in late September. His power, speed, and, more recently, his improvements on defense give him rare upside as a 30/30 threat and plus center field defender. During the offseason, Milwaukee signed Chourio to an eight-year (plus two options), $82 million contract that could earn Chourio as much as $140 million depending on whether those options are exercised.

Chourio checks most of the boxes from a visual scouting standpoint. He’s a plus-plus runner (routinely 4.10 from home to first, at times a jailbreak 4.00 seconds flat) who has grown into being a great center field defender even though the former second baseman has only played there full-time for two seasons and change. He also has plus-plus bat speed and is capable of putting balls into the seats to all fields. The length of his swing might make it tough for Chourio to catch up to major league velocity up around his hands, and there’s a rigidity to the way his hands work that we don’t love, which is where the little bit of hit tool risk comes from. But Chourio’s talent is so electrifying that even if he’s a flawed contact hitter, he’s still going to do enough other stuff at a high level to be a star player.

Plus, it’s encouraging that Chourio’s strikeout rate has improved since early in 2022, when he first began using this high-octane swing. It’s possible he’s just getting better feel for this relatively new style of swinging over time and that everything will be fine. He’s also developed a more dynamic approach during the last two seasons and is now cutting out his leg kick with two strikes. Because he’s already shown the aptitude to make adjustments like this, we can expect that he’ll be able to shorten up his swing if it turns out he needs to. Again, whatever qualms we have with Chourio’s swing he makes up for with his bat speed (which enables him to smash fastballs he’s a bit late on toward the opposite field) and the power he generates on contact. The Baby Acuña comps are a little overzealous, as Chourio’s body and athletic style are both much more tightly wound than Ronald Acuña Jr.’s. Indeed, from a build and swing standpoint, Bo Bichette is a more apt comparison.

The loose and lanky Misiorowski was up to 95 mph and sitting 91-93 early in 2022 while Midwest JUCOs were still dealing with cold conditions. Throughout the season, his velocity not only climbed back into the 94-97 range that he had shown during the fall of 2021, but blew right past it, and Misiorowski was often up to 100 leading up to the draft. He sat in the upper 90s and touched 100 several times during the MLB Draft Combine, while also flashing a plus slider with huge length. He was ranked 24th on the FanGraphs draft board but fell all the way to pick 63. By the time he was pitching at 2022 instructs, Misiorowski had already added a second breaking ball to his repertoire and looked incredibly nasty, though whether he’d find the plate in any given outing was highly variable. That continued in a caricatured way in 2023, as Miz accrued 20 starts across three levels, totaled 71.1 IP, struck out 35% of opposing hitters, and saw his walk rate climb at each stop, culminating in a gnarly 15% BB% at Double-A Biloxi.

Misiorowski’s fastball averaged 97 mph in 2023 and touched 102. It was one thing to see him do that three innings at a time coming off prolonged rest during 2022 instructs, and another to watch him do it across 70 innings. He gets way down the mound and creates tough angle on his fastball at the top of the zone. His breaking balls also have elite quantifiable movement. His curveball bends in around the 82-85 mph range with gigantic lateral wipe, while his slider is more likely to be 84-87 mph. So many of Miz’s breakers are nowhere near the zone, and they generated a slightly below-average chase rate for a slider because hitters weren’t biting.

Misiorowski still hasn’t totally grown into his long-limbed body and has way below-average release consistency and command. Lots of scouts and clubs were very fearful he was a relief-only prospect before he was drafted and that’s still the case. You can’t walk as many hitters as Misiorowski has and be a reliable big leaguer, let alone a star, but as a JUCO prospect with just one year of pro instruction so far, there is huge developmental projection here, as well as the physical characteristics you’re looking for in an impact arm. The power and balance of his lower half is remarkable and at a loose 6-foot-7, Miz has the frame to withstand a starter’s workload as he adds strength. Obviously we’re projecting substantially on Misiorowski’s ability to command the baseball for him to grade out this highly. His ceiling as a reliever is big enough that this ranking might be correct even if he never throws enough strikes to start.

Quero is a physical, mostly well-rounded catcher with an exciting hit/power combination and a plus arm. After he destroyed High-A for just 20 games at the end of 2022, the Brewers sent Quero straight to Double-A in 2023, and he responded by slashing .262/.339/.440 and upping his previously concerning walk rate to 10%. He also more than doubled his previous career home run total by swatting 16 of them, though Biloxi and many Southern League ballparks tend to inflate homers.

Quero gets right on top of the plate and is looking to pull the ball in the air as much as possible. He is best at snatching fastballs up around his hands and lining them down the left field line, which is how he does most of his extra-base damage. This approach can leave him vulnerable to stuff on the outer edge, which he sometimes struggles to even reach, but so far it was worked for Quero, who has never struck out more than 19% of the time at any minor league level. Quero’s 85% in-zone contact rate would be top 10 among big league catchers, but his overall contact rate is more toward the middle of that position group because, despite his uptick in walks, Quero is still pretty chase-prone. His swing rates (56-57% the last two years) are way up there with the Mario Felicianos, Francisco Mejías and Jorge Alfaros of the world, predecessors whose monster tools have been severely undercut by their voracious approaches. Yainer Diaz had a rock solid 2022 debut with similar rate stats, and Quero is a better defender than Mejía (identical rate contact stats), so we can project him north of Mejía’s outcome pretty comfortably.

Quero can get caught in between whether he wants to block or backhand pitches in the dirt to his right, but otherwise he’s a good defensive catcher, especially for a 21-year-old. He has a plus arm and routinely pops below 1.9 seconds, and his receiving and pitch framing are much better than most college-aged catchers. He’s now on Milwaukee’s 40-man and is a good enough defender that they should feel comfortable with him getting big league time in 2024 if anything happens to William Contreras or Gary Sánchez. Long-term, he projects as a primary catcher, though Contreras’ emergence might complicate things.

A fourth rounder in 2019, Ortiz has a career .286/.357/.449 line in the minors and reached the big leagues in 2023. With so many other infielders also in the upper-level mix for playing time, chiefly Gunnar Henderson and Jackson Holliday, the Orioles traded Ortiz as part of a package for Corbin Burnes. His profile was initially rooted in his plus combination of defense and feel for contact, but in 2023, he traded some of that contact for meaningfully more power. Ortiz’s underlying contact quality took a leap across the board, most notably his hard-hit rate, which rose from 31% in 2022 to 46% in 2023. This was coupled with a noticeable shift in his physicality, as Ortiz looked bigger and stronger. Ortiz’s contact rates, both overall and in-zone, dropped a tad compared to 2022 and he’s a bit chase-prone, but his well-rounded offensive output should clear the relatively low bar for middle infielders.

While a capable shortstop, Ortiz is not quite the defender that Willy Adames is. Unless Adames is also traded, Ortiz is more likely to wind up playing second base, where he is an exceptional, Gold Glove-caliber defender. His range and acrobatics are rare for that position. If not for Rhys Hoskins’ presence at first base, Milwaukee’s current projected group of Adames, Ortiz, and Brice Turang would be one of the best infield defenses in baseball. Ortiz projects as an everyday middle infielder at either position and is talented enough to be a part of Milwaukee’s core for the next half decade.

Wilken has plus-plus present raw power and hit several balls harder than 115 mph at Wake, where he slashed an amazing .299/.419/.679 during his career. He generates that power with a comically simple swing. He’s an extremely patient hitter who rarely chases, and most of Wilken’s whiffs come against sliders that finish in the strike zone but that he simply can’t reach because his approach is so pull-oriented. His contact ability will probably trend down as he climbs the minors, but so far Wilken has had a successful post-draft debut, hitting .285/.414/.473 in 47 games. Wilken’s selectivity and the lift in his swing help ensure that he’ll get to his power in games despite what will probably be a 40-grade hit tool during his career, and his on-base skills will also help keep his offensive profile afloat.

The power and OBP components together are important because there’s a chance Wilken ends up at first base. He has big raw arm strength, but his size and stiffness aren’t a clean fit at third base in the big leagues, where he’ll be measured against the Matt Chapmans and Nolan Arenados of the world. He’ll need to work to stay as agile and mobile as possible to avoid a shift to first. For now, I have him projected as a 40-grade third sacker. Just outside the Top 100 prospects, Wilken was a Pick to Click with an everyday corner infield tool set, and we want to see him retain strong levels of contact through a large Double-A sample before moving him into the 50 FV tier.

Lara is a very athletic little switch-hitting center field prospect with an exciting early career contact track record. He’s small, but he’s very twitchy and strong for his size. Lara’s righty swing is more dangerous than his lefty swing, but he’s found ways to put the ball in play despite his lack of polish from that side. Lara has a shot to stay in center field but isn’t a lock. He’s a plus runner and is capable of covering a ton of ground (he’s made some spectacular plays during his first big league spring training in 2024), but his ball skills are currently pretty bad, and Lara doesn’t always look comfortable catching the baseball. Lara’s explosion for a hitter his size is pretty impressive and I do think he’s going to get stronger even though he lacks classic frame projection. He has a chance to be a well-rounded everyday center fielder if his defense improves.

Knoth has a lightning-fast arm that was only producing low-90s velocity throughout his showcase summer, but his drop-and-drive delivery was incredibly athletic, his fastball was seasoned by riding life, and he was snapping off the best curveball in the class. Knoth’s breaking ball is the Grim Reaper, an absolute yakker in the 78-80 mph range with huge downward break. He experienced a velocity boost in the spring of 2023 and moved from the early second round of the FanGraphs draft board into the first. Knoth doesn’t have prototypical starter’s size but he’s a superlative on-mound athlete with mechanics that are as repeatable as they are electric. You can go nuts projecting on his changeup and a second breaking ball because of his arm speed and proclivity for spin, respectively. This is also a cold weather prospect who was still 17 on draft day. Knoth’s mix already looks like that of a premium reliever and he may just be scratching the surface of his ability.

The best prospect Milwaukee received as part of the Josh Hader trade with San Diego, Gasser is an athletic, low-slot lefty with an ultra-short arm action and command of four or five different pitches. He is quickly marching to the big leagues and could arrive in the middle of 2024 given the amount of starter turnover ahead of him in the Brewers org.

When Gasser is really humming, he’s dotting backdoor breaking balls and driving hitters mad by mixing uphill fastballs and cutters up around their hands. While he doesn’t throw especially hard, his low arm slot gives him some ability to climb the ladder with his fastball and miss bats even at 91-94 mph, though this approach is probably going to make him prone to fly balls and homers. Our fear that righties are going to tee off on his fastball was enough to keep Gasser off the Top 100 prospects list and has us projecting him more as a contender’s backend starter who probably gets shifted into the bullpen in the playoffs.

During the regular season, Gasser’s skills are still going to be very valuable. He has a master’s degree in pitch sequencing and the east/west command to weaponize it. His slider has big, lengthy sweep, and his fastballs and cutters interact with one another in ways that confound hitters and cause a lot of awkward swings. Gasser’s changeup has not developed as we would typically hope/project for such an athletic and loose lefty, which is another reason we slid him below the cut line of the Top 100 even though he dominated Triple-A in 2023. All of his good pitches have glove-side action except the two-seam variant of Gasser’s fastball, which is pretty vulnerable when located to his arm side. Gasser is going to be a valuable big league starter but probably not an impact one.

Brown was a career .306/.431/.501 hitter at Coastal Carolina before becoming a late first-round pick in 2022. He spent a fair bit of his 2023 whole-season debut on the shelf with a non-displaced fracture of his left shoulder, which may have impacted his offensive output upon return. Brown hit .255/.358/.354 in 2023, mostly at High-A, and then had a stronger Fall League look (.297/.391/.462).

Brown’s unique swing has been toned down a bit since college but is still entertaining and strange, as his hands start up around his face (they used to be directly over top of his head) with his bat pointing toward the third base coach. He’s such a compact, short-levered athlete that he’s usually on time to make contact despite his swing’s noise, and Brown performed about as well as hoped from a bat-to-ball standpoint in 2023, with a 90% z-contact rate. He’s especially adept at making contact with high pitches and was executing a pull-and-lift approach in the AFL. Brown’s T-Rex arms can make it tough for him to cover the down/away portion of the zone, and he’s going to need to close his stride and bend in the lower body to get to those pitches. He struggles with this, and his tendency to play upright extends to his defense at shortstop, which is flashy but inconsistent. Brown simply isn’t a very good bender — his range and creativity are fantastic, but there are certain plays he makes too slowly because of a lack of lower body flexibility.

There will probably need to be adjustments in order for Brown to hit his ceiling, but his contact ability and aspects of his athleticism are pretty special. I think he’ll be a Jon Berti type of utilityman even if some of his current issues remain, and if Brown solves them, he has a regular shortstop’s skill set.

Black is entertaining as hell to watch play baseball, but I am skeptical that he’s going to be the foundational young player that some folks across baseball think he’ll be. He’s fast, he has a keen eye, he plays with lots of effort, and he swings hard for a small-ish guy. He slashed .284/.417/.513 across Double- and Triple-A in 2023 and raised his career minor league line ton excellent .279/.415/.465. For the last couple of years, Black (and my forecast for him) has been fumbling around for a defensive home. He has largely played second base during the last half decade and gave center field a try in 2022, but moved to third base in 2023 and even began to get some reps at first. He actually looked pretty good at third base aside from his throwing stroke, which sometimes looks odd and lacks accuracy. It’s a big enough issue that I have him projected to first base and will speculate he’ll eventually play the outfield corner, as well. Black’s 2023 power output was likely a caricature of his true ability. His game is grounded in his contact and (more significantly) on-base skills. He lacks the power typical of a corner infielder and I also have some reservations about his ability to carry above-average contact rates to the big leagues. Black needs a ton of effort to swing hard and his head often flies all over the place. His swing also has a hole in it (up and away) that will be probed by big league fastballs until he proves he can close it. So no, I don’t have Black evaluated as an everyday player. Because he’s backed into a fair bit of defensive versatility, runs well, and has a plus-plus skill in his plate discipline, he’ll still have roster utility as corner role player of modest impact.

Rodriguez had a fantastic pro debut in the DSL, where he slashed .253/.393/.449 with more walks than strikeouts. He stands a chance to be a power-hitting center fielder and progress in the way that Twins center field prospect Emmanuel Rodriguez has to this point, with on-base skills and defense supporting a profile that includes a lot of strikeouts. Yophery has precocious power for a hitter his age, let alone one who is likely to stay at a premium position. He’s a tightly wound athlete with some effort to his swing, and it’s likely he’ll whiff underneath high fastballs as he faces better velocity. His plate discipline and feel for center field should tilt the balance of his overall profile into a favorable place even if that occurs. Yophery isn’t as rangy and projectable as most high-upside teenage hitters, and he’s a little stiff as an athlete. For those reasons, he’s valued here more like a high second-round pick than a top-tier, first-round high schooler.

Quintana is the latest prospect to fit what seems to be Milwaukee’s favorite archetype: the hitterish Venezuelan shortstop. Though scouts universally believe Quintana will need to get stronger, he is a virtual lock to stay at short and has fantastic, advanced feel for contact from both sides of the plate. There is some disagreement about how projectable Quintana is (he’s a bit thicker than most hitters this age), but if he hits and plays shortstop, he’ll be a high-floor utility prospect. If the power arrives, Quintana could be an impact player.

Blalock was selected as a safety pick in the 32nd round of the 2019 draft under the assumption that he was heading to school, but at the end of the day, Boston had enough bonus pool money left to sign him for $250,000. He had an inconsistent full-season debut in 2021 but also showed significant growth in terms of velocity, sitting 93-95 mph. He entered 2022 as a potential breakout guy, but Blalock had Tommy John just before the season and never threw a pitch. He returned in May of 2023 and looked whole, as Blalock made 15 starts (usually going four or five innings per start) while showing pre-surgery arm strength and a better changeup. The Red Sox traded him to Milwaukee at the 2023 deadline for Luis Urías and he made just four starts in the Brewers system before his season ended with an oblique strain. Milwaukee added Blalock to their 40-man roster after the season.

Blalock is a below-average athlete and his long-ish arm action makes his delivery look somewhat relievery, but he has four viable pitches and starter-quality command. He’ll show you a mid-90s downhill heater, two distinct breaking balls (which are tough to parse from Blalock’s fastball and one another), and a mid-80s changeup that succeeds because of Blalock’s command of it rather than its movement. Aspects of Blalock’s upright delivery that detract from his fastball’s effectiveness aid in hiding his breaking balls, which he can land for a strike when he wants. It’s average stuff that sings because of Blalock’s command, and he should be a José Urquidy type of backend starter who shifts into a long relief role on a great team’s playoff roster.

Henderson was a dominant junior college pitcher who punched 169 tickets in just 97 innings during his draft year. He has barely pitched in pro ball because the Brewers shut him down after he was drafted (which is pretty typical, especially in this org), he had a relatively minor elbow surgery early in 2022 that cost him most of the year, and further soreness nixed a planned Fall League stint at the end of that season. Henderson’s 2023 got off to a delayed start to manage his innings, but he was dominant when he pitched. Across 18 starts at Low-A, including many second half starts of five or six innings, Henderson struck out 35% of opponents and had a 2.75 ERA. He did so despite sitting about 92 mph and using just two pitches, the other being his plus, screwball-style changeup.

This spring, Henderson is throwing much harder, albeit in short outings. In his one Cactus League inning prior to publication, he was sitting 95-97. Context is important; Henderson is totally rested and worked just a single inning. But if Henderson is going to throw that hard for an inning at time, it could make sense to fast track him in relief since he might only be a reliever anyway. Henderson is a shorter guy with a high-effort delivery. He’s thrown strikes as a pro, but he’s also been hurt some and the look of his delivery is more typical in a bullpen. Then there’s the issue of a third pitch, which Henderson is still searching for. He used an uphill cutter in 2023 but a source indicated to me that his breaking ball now has more slider shape in the 83-84 mph range. Whether or not that pitch is a hit this season might dictate which track Henderson ends up on, possibly by the middle of the year. His changeup is a pretty special pitch and, if paired with an uphill, mid-90s fastball for an inning at a time, is the sort of weapon you find on a higher-leverage reliever. I expect Henderson to be promoted very aggressively in 2024 because it’s his 40-man evaluation year, and there’s a chance it will make sense for Milwaukee to ‘pen him late in the season and allow him to debut as a reliever in September without burning one of his options.

I had Pratt evaluated as a back-of-the-first-round prospect prior to the 2023 draft and he ended up signing for an amount closer to the 50th pick’s slot value. After watching him against pro pitching last summer, I’ve rounded down my projection down just a bit, as Pratt looked a little less athletic on defense than I was comfortable with. He’s tall and plays defense with a high center of gravity, atypical of successful infielders. Pratt still has lightning fast hitting hands and peppers both gaps with extra-base contact. His front side is a little stiff through the contact point, but Pratt rotates with verve through the hips and hit the ball with power on the showcase circuit. He’s likely to grow into more raw power as he fills out and should have a potent hit/pop combination at maturity. Pratt was a little less comfortable facing pro-quality stuff last year than I would have anticipated based on his prep look, but he was at his best late in the season against some of the harder-throwing arms in the ACL. He falls behind some of the other high-variance teenagers in the org on this update but is still a good prospect.

After something of a breakout first full season in pro ball, Adams’ broad strokes scouting report has begun to read like that of Orioles prospect Coby Mayo. Like Mayo, Adams’ size limits his mobility at third base enough to put his future there in doubt. Also like Mayo, Adams has a kind of ridiculous swing that seems to be working for him. He slashed .233/.400/.401 as a 19-year-old at Low-A last year, stole 30 bases and hit 11 homers. Adams’ underlying hit data is even better than that. His contact metrics — 8% swinging strike rate, 83% in-zone contact — were impressive for a teenage hitter Adams’ size and his measured power — 41% hard-hit rate, 112 max exit velo — even more so. The gap between Adams’ spreadsheet power and his actual 2023 slugging was pretty substantial, indicating a 2024 breakout could be looming.

But will Adams’ swing hold water against upper-level pitching? He has a comically large leg kick and low hand load in the Yermín Mercedes mold, and his swing is bottom-hand dominant, covering the bottom of the zone. There’s an awful lot going on and there are reasonable doubts about Adams’ ability to time all the component parts as he climbs. And if he ends up moving to first base permanently, it’s possible none of this will matter because he’ll need to find another gear of offense to be a meaningfully good player at that position. Adams is off to an exciting start for a guy who signed for a little less than $300,000 a couple of drafts ago; he was already a good pick. That context can give us a sort of whiplash where we overvalue the player because of how much better things are going than anticipated and I’m being careful not to do that with Adams, who I now value on par with a second round prospect.

There was a stretch early during the 2023 draft’s scouting calendar when it looked like Bitonti might be one of the top 15 or 20 prospects in the entire class. He had precocious power, was young for the class, and looked like he had a chance to remain at third base. As the process played out, he swung and missed at an elevated rate and his defensive forecast trended down the spectrum, from third base to maybe right field or first base due to his enormous size. The combination of hit tool and defense risk had me lower on Bitonti than the industry mean prior to the draft. He signed for $1.75 million and struck out at a 31% clip after the draft, often underneath high fastballs. There is almost certainly going to be huge power here a couple of years from now and it’s reasonable to hope that, like Owen Caissie, it’s enough thump to make up for other issues.

Dunn, whose brother Ross is in the Twins system, was a Yankees’ 2019 11th round pick out of Utah. He hit .196 coming out of the lost 2020 season, and spent a significant portion of both 2021 and 2022 on the IL dealing with multiple injuries, including a fractured jaw, an abdomen strain, and a hamstring strain. The Phillies drafted him in the minor league phase of the 2022 Rule 5 Draft and Dunn had a huge power breakout in 2023 at Double-A Reading, where he hit .271/.396/.506 and slugged 21 homers, more than he had hit throughout his entire career entering 2023. Reading is a hitter’s haven and Dunn was in his age-25 season, so there are good reasons to be skeptical of his sudden change in output, but his underlying power metrics also took a leap, with his average and peak exit velocities (92 mph and 112 mph, respectively) cresting above the big league average. This isn’t gigantic, impact power, but it’s meaningful pop for a second baseman. Dunn swings and misses quite a bit, especially within the strike zone, but he’s a dangerous all-fields hitter because of his power and ability to catch some fastballs deep in the hitting zone and punish them the other way.

Dunn isn’t an especially good defensive second baseman, nor is he versatile. He has spent a bit of minor league time at third base (including five AFL games) and in left field, but his lack of mobility and arm strength make him a below-average, second base-only defender in my eyes. This lack of versatility is the biggest barrier between Dunn and 2024 major league playing time. I have him evaluated as an above-replacement player but not one of big impact, similar to Cavan Biggio without plate discipline quite as good.

Rodriguez is another of the many Brewers junior college pitcher draftees. He followed a breakout 2022 with a very solid 2023 in which he worked 128 innings of sub-3.00 ERA ball across 26 starts, all but one at Double-A Biloxi. He’s an undersized righty with below average arm strength, but Rodriguez is an above-average athlete with a plus changeup and two good breaking balls, and he’s now K’d 26% of upper-level hitters across a starter’s load of innings. Rodriguez added a few ticks of velo in 2022 and has sustained it as his workload has increased. He sits parked in the 91-93 mph range and tends to create sink/tail action at release (which is why he can really turn his changeup over), but his (lack of) size and low-to-the-ground delivery create a shallow angle on his fastball, which makes it tough for some hitters to get on top of.

Make no mistake, at just 92 mph on average that fastball is not an impact pitch, and Rodriguez has to rely on secondaries to get by. But all three of his other pitches are pretty good, especially Rodriguez’s changeup, which generated a whopping 50% miss rate (per Synergy) in 2023. He’ll mix in a variety of breaking ball speeds and shapes, as well. Rodriguez’s line to the plate is incredibly direct and he should throw enough strikes to start, but he lacks precise command. That’s largely why he’s still evaluated as a backend guy here rather than a Gasser/Blalock type with a shot to be a no. 4 starter.

Among Milwaukee’s more prominent 2023 international signees was Di Turi, who acquitted himself pretty well in his DSL debut. He’s a well-rounded teenage shortstop who is very likely to remain at the position and has a chance to be an impact defender there. The contact and on-base skills to support a utility profile are present, and Di Turi has enough body projection to be optimistic about him developing big league-level physicality, though probably not enough to be a star. He’s a high-floored utility infield prospect with a puncher’s chance to be a regular if the offensive components improve as he matures.

Crow, an athletic, low-slot righty, had success as a Double-A starter throughout 2022 and might have made his big league debut already if not for elbow inflammation that landed him on the IL after just four 2023 starts. Crow did not return and had Tommy John in August of last year, which will keep him debuting until 2025.

It’s easy to bucket Crow as a righty specialist at first blush, but his surgical east/west command and breaking ball quality, especially his ability to vary the shape and depth of a couple different breakers, gives him the platoon-neutralizing weapons to be a starter. Healthy Crow has also shown murderous command. He hammers the zone with his upshot fastball and two different breaking balls, throwing basically all of his pitches for strikes at a 70% clip in 2022. He is a fantastic on-mound athlete who repeats his mechanics with robotic consistency. This enables Crow’s slow fastball to stay out of danger because it’s not usually left in the meat of the zone. His even fastball/breaking ball usage and ability to throw either for a strike at any time makes him very unpredictable. He’s going to be a reliable member of a big league staff in some capacity, either as a fifth starter (projected here) or a strike-throwing long man. The timing of his surgery makes him a plausible 2024 Fall League candidate.

Straight out of Brewers’ infield prospect central casting comes Peña, who is like a little Eric Brown Jr. clone. Peña’s well-built, medium frame and top-hand-driven swing generate doubles pop. He may have a special enough hit tool to profile as an everyday second baseman if he can’t stick at short, which scouts are split on. There are also a couple of teams that don’t have much info on Peña for whatever reason; his expected bonus was one of the last ones I could get confirmed during work on the international amatuer list.

Woessner’s role is up in the air, as he had a fair amount of success in his first full pro season as a starter but is throwing much, much harder in a relief role as 2024 camp gets underway. Woessner pitched 121 High-A innings in 2023 and sat 92-94 with downhill plane and just enough changeup quality to keep his hopes of starting alive. He’s built like an innings-eating starter and still has a couple of seasons to develop before Milwaukee has to make a 40-man decision. This spring, he was parked in the 97-99 mph range as a reliever. Woessner has a potentially plus breaking ball (especially if it also gets faster in a shift to relief) and would be a quick-mover as a three-pitch bullpen weapon, but the Brewers have lots of other comparable relievers tracking ahead of his 2026 debut timeline and there’s no reason to rush him in such a role. Obviously if Woessner can sustain his early 2024 velo across a starter’s load of innings, then we’re talking about an entirely different level of prospect. For now, he has one of the better shots to start of all the arms in this tier of the system.

Smith had TJ during his draft year and signed as an undrafted free agent in 2021. Back from rehab in the fall of 2022, he was 93-95 with a good curveball and spotty control. His velocity took a leap in 2023 as Smith was sitting 94-97 at the end of the season, and he’s carried that velocity into the start of 2024. Along with adequate big league-reliever velocity, Smith has a plus breaking ball, a low-80s slurve with big depth that induced a nearly 50% miss rate in 2023. The tempo of Smith’s delivery also makes him tough to time, and it take hitters a few pitches to get comfortable. Smith had a cutter upon his return from TJ, but that pitch may have been scrubbed from his repertoire. He profiles as a standard two-pitch reliever and if he keeps pitching like he has at the start of 2024, he’ll be up at some point in 2025.

Low was a Day Three high school pick in 2021 who has developed as a two-way player so far. His future in on the mound, where Low sits 96-97, will touch 100 mph, and has a nasty vertical breaking ball. He walked nearly a batter per inning last year, but he’s pretty likely to be a 40-man add after the 2024 season unless things totally unravel for him because he’s probably just scratching the surface of his ability as a pitcher. He may spend his first 40-man season entirely in the minors, but his long-term projection is that of a middle reliever with a little extra shot for a right-tail outcome because he only just began to pitch full-time.

Areinamo has plus feel for contact, but little power and no real defensive home. He’s young but has a relatively maxed out frame, and the way he trends athletically in the near future is going to be important to his defensive fit and his overall role.

Areinamo has one of the more entertaining right-handed swings in pro baseball. It is evocative of the way Yuli Gurriel‘s masterful stroke looks through contact, but Areinamo’s pre-swing gesticulations are unique to him. Even though he’s a thicker guy, Areinamo is a gifted rotational athlete with WD-40’d hips whose offensive operation is about the way his body moves more than raw strength, which he lacks. He can move the barrel all over the place but expands the zone far too much. While he’s often bailed out by his hand-eye coordination and barrel feel, Areinamo’s tendency to swing at balls both hurts his OBP and also leads to a lot of weaker contact even though he’s putting the ball in play a ton.

As a poor defensive second baseman, he needs more than just one good offensive tool to succeed. I’m smitten with his rare hitting skill and swing aesthetic, but something has to change or develop here for Areinamo to be a big leaguer. He either needs to hit for more power, be more selective, or improve his defense in terms of quality and versatility. Strength and conditioning changes might be a catalyst for a couple of those things. There are still two full seasons before Areinamo’s first 40-man decision, so it’s really the 2025 season by which I’d like to see tangible improvement here.

A Canadian high schooler who signed for a little less than $600,000 in 2022, O’Rae was brought along slowly and kept on the complex to start the 2023 season. After posting a (BABIP-aided) .522 OBP for a couple of months, he was promoted to Low-A Carolina and posted more walks than strikeouts for the better part of a month. He also stole 44 bases on 50 attempts in just 60 games across the two levels. The high-end outcome for O’Rae is a Tony Kemp type player, or maybe Ender Inciarte if his center field defense improves that much. He has experience at both middle infield positions and in center, and while he’s raw in all facets of defense, O’Rae’s speed and athleticism are a fit in center field and he has a shot to be pretty good out there. The infield is a less natural fit for him, as his hands aren’t especially good. O’Rae has a proclivity for oppo contact and was very difficult to make whiff last year. It’s contact of the low-impact variety and will probably stay that way because of his lack of size. Plus speed and defense are most likely to carry O’Rae to a big league role, and if he can sustain his early career contact rates (I’m skeptical), then some of those peak Kemp type years are in play.

A compact little converted catcher who now plays all over the infield, Baez hit a cartoonish .370/.395/.557 on the 2023 complex and was Milwaukee’s best hitter down the stretch of their ACL championship run. Baez has fantastic hand-eye coordination and barrel feel, but he’s far too aggressive of a hitter to continue performing like this as he climbs. He lacks the present power and body projection of a long-term third base prospect, and it will be important for him to develop defensive versatility as he climbs because the likely low OBP and medium power output doesn’t really fit at third base alone. Baez has a very promising hit tool; the rest needs to develop.

An athletic, relief-only righty who K’d 10/9 IP in Low-A last year, Rodriguez’s fastball averages 96-97 mph and some of his mid-80s sliders are plus. Yerlin’s athletic drop-and-drive delivery helps his fastball play as a bat-misser, but his lack of feel for location often prevents him from living in effective fastball locations. He has slam dunk middle-inning stuff right now at age 22 and remains somewhat projectable. Rodriguez checks some visual scouting boxes (mechanics and athleticism), as well as some data-oriented ones (slider movement) besides just his arm strength. He’s also a relief-only A-ball arm, so I’m not going too crazy running Yerlin up this list even though he’s clearly a good prospect. The 2024 season is his 40-man eval year, so it’s possible Milwaukee will promote him a little more aggressively. If he pitches well, he could debut in 2025.

Wood is an undersized, contact-hitting catcher whose ceiling is in the Garrett Stubbs area. His compact lefty stroke generates a ton of soft, all-fields contact, and Wood’s bat-to-ball metrics (a 6% swinging strike rate and 85% contact rate) are comfortably plus. Aside from his receiving, which is pretty good considering he didn’t often catch pro-quality stuff in college, Wood has some developing to do on defense. His throwing needs the most help, as he sometimes pops close to 2.10. He seems to be experimenting with Patrick Bailey-style sidearm throwing, but Wood is a slower-twitch guy whose exchange takes too long most of the time. Penn State isn’t exactly a baseball hotbed and Wood deserves time to develop his defense before there’s some kind of damning, collective proclamation that he can’t catch. He’s tracking like a bat-first third catcher and he could be more of a career backup if aspects of his defense improve.

This is more of a projection valuation of Rudy, whose fastball is still just in the 91-92 mph range as he approaches his 23rd birthday. Rudy’s slender build and beautiful delivery are both typical of a big league starter, and he can really spin a breaking ball. He had strike-throwing success (7.8% walks in 2023) across 80 Low-A innings last year, Rudy’s first full season of pro instruction coming out of a D-III program. There’s enough here to consider Rudy as a spot starter, and though he isn’t currently missing a ton of bats, I think there’s a chance he’ll throw harder into his mid-20s and have a more favorable evaluation in 2025 or so.

Letson is a very exciting frame- and delivery-driven projection prospect. He’s lanky, generates big extension down the mound, and has lovely natural breaking ball length and depth. Adding velocity will be important, but Letson’s build justifies optimism in that regard. This is a high-variance prospect who could really pop at any time. He didn’t pitch after the draft and is a key early 2024 follow who could climb this list substantially across the next six months or so.

Chirino showed a velocity bump in the spring of 2023, working 94-97 with sink while mixing in a two-plane curveball in the 80-84 mph range. He didn’t really get the opportunity to show what that new velocity would do for his game because rolling rib cage and lat injuries shelved him in late May. He has a cross-bodied delivery with a sinking/tailing heater (up to 98 in the spring of 2024) and a long sweeper. The Brewers have had success with late-breaking arms like this before (think Justin Topa) and Chirinos’ arm strength looks intact after those injuries, but he’s also been getting shelled so far this spring. He’s more of an older, upper-level arm to monitor because Chirinos hasn’t been healthy with this kind of arm strength for very long.

After tearing his ACL in 2022, Rodriguez slashed .291/.359/.367 at Double-A in 2023. He has been pretty much the same player since entering pro ball, one with plus speed and feel for contact but whose bottom-of-the-scale power and plate discipline undermine those skills. Rodriguez still runs well enough to play center field coming off the ACL and looked even better from a conditioning standpoint in the spring of 2024. His offensive profile is like a serial killer speed dating: lots of slashing, singles only. It’s more of a fifth outfielder’s skill set than a fourth’s because Rodriguez’s center field defense is more average than plus.

Garcia still presents enough of a power and defense combo to be big league utility depth. He’s an acrobatic shortstop with a plus arm, and he’s still only 21 and has just shy of average big league raw power while remaining physically projectable. His skills and issues are similar to Tim Beckham’s, and my hope is Garcia can have that kind of brief peak amid more common years when he’s bottom-of-the-roster depth. Garcia will probably always strike out at a 30% or so clip and will be an inconsistent offensive performer, but shortstops who play defense like this are rare.

Ibarguen’s defensive versatility (he’s already played second, third and all three outfield spots) and pound-for-pound strength separate him from some of the other small-framed hitters from Milwaukee’s DSL group. He slashed .311/.437/.447 in the 2023 DSL, runs well, swings hard for a player his size (his top hand is very involved with his swing), and has demonstrated above-average feel for contact. This is a potential super utility type who is probably several years away from the big leagues.

Alastre hit .287/.387/.375 with more walks than strikeouts in the 2023 DSL. He’s of medium build and has bottom-of-the-scale power right now, but he demonstrated the best feel for contact of any hitter from the org’s two-team DSL group. Alastre’s early career contact performance is exceptional (86% contact, 92% in-zone contact), and amazing for a teenage switch-hitter. He badly needs to get stronger. While small-ish, Alastre isn’t so diminutive as to warrant skepticism that he will; he’s only 5-foot-10 or so, but he’s built like a Division-I infield prospect and should add a fair bit of strength. Alastre has played three different infield positions and it’s hard to truly know where he’ll settle in this regard, making it tough to have a very specific projection for him. For now, he’s a hit-tool sleeper at the bottom of the system.

Made is a compact, switch-hitting infielder. While he’s quite athletic, Made’s power is limited by his lack of size. His swing is a bit long, but Made is a relatively compact athlete and should be on time enough to spray line drives everywhere. Whether he has the arm strength to play shortstop will influence whether he has a chance to be a regular. Made signed for just shy of $1 million in January and will begin his career in the 2024 DSL.

Cortez is one of several young Nicaraguan pitchers from the Brewers’ 2023 signing class. He had an absurd pro debut in the DSL — 45.2 IP, 35 H, 5 BB, 49 K — during which he allowed less than one baserunner per inning. Cortez is small, a stocky, nearly maxed out 6-feet. He isn’t especially projectable and only sits about 90 mph, but his command and his fastball’s other traits help that pitch punch above its velocity weight class. Cortez also has two swing-and-miss secondaries in a huge sweeper and a sink/tail changeup, both of which he also commands. Cortez is a high-floored type whose fastball playability will be tested by more advanced hitters as he climbs the minors. Can he throw harder even though he lacks traditional body projection? Or will Cortez’s fastball play because of its line and his ability to command it to effective locations? Those are potential avenues for him to outpace his current backend starter forecast.

Boeve was a pre-draft data and heuristics darling who only struck out nine times as a junior. The lefty-hitting third baseman did so against smaller school competition in the Summit League, posting an OBP over .500. Boeve’s swing path is a little long as it enters the hitting zone and it may be tough for him to handle good velo. It hasn’t been an issue yet, as Boeve had a 4-to-1 ball in play-to-whiff ratio combined between his 2022 on Cape Cod and his junior year at Omaha, and a 5-to-3 ratio after the draft. This is definitely a hit-over-power profile on a corner infielder, and so it behooves Boeve and the Brewers to try him at other positions in pro ball since he’s likely not an everyday third baseman. After the draft, the Brewers tried Boeve at second base, which mostly didn’t go well. I’m skeptical the hit tool carries actual water because of the way his swing works and think Boeve is more of a fair small school sleeper in need of dev.

Hudson was slow to develop big league velocity as a Cubs prospect, and it took him eight seasons to debut. He’s a gigantic, low-ish slot reliever with a low-90s fastball that tends to induce abnormally high chase rates because hitters are so uncomfortable with Hudson’s release point. His stuff is otherwise pretty generic and he’s likely to play an up/down role.

A two-way amateur player whose career took him all over the place (from high school in Canada to a U.S. JUCO, and then Alabama and Louisiana-Monroe), King has only focused on pitching for a little while and already has a riding, swing-and-miss fastball. He posted a whopping 17.9% swinging strike rate in 2023 while throwing fastballs 72% of the time. King really only has slightly above-average arm strength, but he hides the ball well and it’s tough to get on top of his heater. He’s a freaky sleeper for now because he and the Brewers need to find a better second pitch and more consistent strike-throwing ability during the next couple of seasons.