The Fringe Five: Baseball’s Most Compelling Fringe Prospects

The Fringe Five is a weekly regular-season exercise, introduced a few years ago by the present author, wherein that same author utilizes regressed stats, scouting reports, and also his own fallible intuition to identify and/or continue monitoring the most compelling fringe prospects in all of baseball.

Central to the exercise, of course, is a definition of the word fringe, a term which possesses different connotations for different sorts of readers. For the purposes of the column this year, a fringe prospect (and therefore one eligible for inclusion in the Five) is any rookie-eligible player at High-A or above who (a) received a future value grade of 45 or less from Dan Farnsworth during the course of his organizational lists and who (b) was omitted from the preseason prospect lists produced by Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus, MLB.com’s Jonathan Mayo, and John Sickels, and also who (c) is currently absent from a major-league roster. Players appearing on an updated prospect list or, otherwise, selected in the first round of the current season’s amateur draft will also be excluded from eligibility.

In the final analysis, the basic idea is this: to recognize those prospects who are perhaps receiving less notoriety than their talents or performance might otherwise warrant.

Chance Adams, RHP, New York AL (Profile)
Adams debuted among the Five proper last week on the strength (generally) of his season-to-date performance and (specifically) his two most recent starts. The first of those appearances was impressive for the outcome itself: against Pirates affiliate Bradenton, the 21-year-old Adams recorded a 10:0 strikeout-to-walk ratio against just 17 batters over 5.0 no-hit innings. The line from the second start was less conspicuously great (5.1 IP, 19 TBF, 3 K, 1 BB) but notable for another reason: it was the product of Adams’ first Double-A appearance. The right-hander recorded his second-ever Double-A start just last night (Thursday) at Orioles affiliate Bowie (box). Adams conceded six runs. Which, that’s not ideal. But he also produced a 8:1 strikeout-to-walk ratio against 25 batters. Which, more ideal. And where matters of projecting future success are concerned, it’s the latter of those marks on which one likely ought to dwell.

Greg Allen, CF, Cleveland (Profile)
This represents Allen’s fifth consecutive appearance among the Five and [occurs] after a week in which Allen played only four games, owing to the Carolina League’s All-Star break. Despite the truncated schedule, the 23-year-old continued to exhibit the skills which earned him a place here each of the four weeks prior, reaching base by a hit, walk, or hit-by-pitch in 8 of his 16 plate appearances while striking out just once during that same interval. Nor is that to acknowledge his actual role in the All-Star game itself, during which he batted leadoff and played center field for the Carolina League. While the author hardly possesses the requisite professional gravitas to declare such a thing unilaterally, it certainly appears as though Allen has mastered the High-A level — a hypothesis further supported utilizing Arbitrary Endpoints in the form of the table below.

Yandy Diaz, 3B/OF, Cleveland (Profile)
During his first two affiliated seasons after signing with Cleveland, Yandy Diaz recorded a total of 200 defensive appearances at third base and zero defensive appearances at all the other positions. Since last Friday, meanwhile, Diaz has recorded one start at third base, one start in right field, and five starts in left — which is to say, infinitely more starts in left and right field than during his whole 2014 or -15 campaigns. What else he’s done since last Friday is record nearly a .300 isolated-power figure while striking out in only 16% of his plate appearances. It’s possible that this latter development is related to the former. Because regard: Diaz’s offensive skills are likely to make him useful to the major-league club. What else would make him useful is complementing those offensive skills with some defensive flexibility.

Here’s footage of Diaz doubling earlier in the week by way of an impressive opposite-field swing:

Chad Green, RHP, New York AL (Profile)
Green first appeared among the Five at the beginning of June, owing not merely to strong statistical indicators at Triple-A but also promising pitch data from his major-league debut. As a member of Scranton/Wilkes-Barre’s rotation this year, he’s produced one of the top strikeout- and walk-rate differentials (19.2 points) among all qualifiers at the minor leagues’ highest level. By itself, however, that distinction doesn’t necessarily portend great future success. Consider: in 2011, left-hander Tommy Milone led all Triple-A qualifiers by that same measure. By a considerable distance, actually. And while Milone has certainly cobbled together some fine major-league seasons, he hasn’t exhibited the sort of dominance that he did in the minors. That he sits at 87-88 mph has likely played no small part in his transition from the minor to major leagues. Green, for his part, He produced an average fastball velocity of nearly 95 mph during his major-league debut against Arizona last month — or, nearly 70-grade velocity, in scouting terms.

Whatever Green’s future, his immediate past has been impressive. Over his last two starts (14.0 innings), the right-hander has recorded a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 20:1 against 49 batters, amounting to rates of 40.8% and 2.0%, respectively — which is to say, figures that are typically the province of the Yankees’ best relief pitchers, not a fringe Triple-A starter.

Here’s footage from his most recent start of Green throwing his slider for a swinging strike to mostly helpless JaCoby Jones:

Sherman Johnson, 2B/3B, Los Angeles AL (Profile)
The concept of Faith is a difficult one about which the author, despite a total lack of credentials, appears ready to freely espouse in this paragraph at a baseball site. On this topic of Faith, there are some who appear to regard it as a sort of fixed belief in an idea — no matter the strength of an argument one might formulate to the contrary. Others, meanwhile, view Faith not as an unflinching stance on a matter, but as a radical acceptance or wild affirmation of reality. For them, to have Faith is to “say yes” to the world, regardless of its ugliness. Still others regard Faith as the debut solo album by British singer George Michael, featuring songs like “Father Figure” and “I Want Your Sex”. During his past week at Triple-A Salt Lake, Sherman Johnson produced nearly a 25% strikeout rate and below-average isolated-power mark — and yet he continues to appear in the Five. This likely indicates some sort of Faith on the author’s part. Which is sort of Faith, though, is what’s less clear.

The Next Five
These are players on whom the author might potentially become fixated.

Jharel Cotton, RHP, Los Angeles NL (Triple-A Pacific Coast League)
Zack Granite, OF, Minnesota (Double-A Southern League)
Jesmuel Valentin, 2B/SS, Philadelphia (Double-A Eastern League)
Ildemaro Vargas, SS, Arizona (Double-A Southern League)
Aaron Wilkerson, RHP, Boston (Triple-A International League)

Fringe Five Scoreboard
Here are the top-10 the players to have appeared among either the Fringe Five (FF) or Next Five (NF) so far this season (which is to say, today). For mostly arbitrary reasons, players are assessed three points for each week they’ve appeared among the Fringe Five; a single point, for each week among the Next Five.