Prospect Ratings, 2006, Part 2: Baseball America’s League Ratings
Baseball America is posting its postseason prospect ratings by league.
Pacific Coast League - top 5 prospects are SS Stephen Drew (Diamondbacks), P Jered Weaver (Angels), 2B Howie Kendrick (Angels), P Chad Billingsley (Dodgers), 3B Andy LaRoche (Dodgers)
International League - top 5 prospects are OF Delmon Young (Devil Rays), OF Lastings Milledge (Mets), P Jeremy Sowers (Indians), P Tom Gorzelanny (Pirates), OF Ryan Sweeney (White Sox)
Texas League - top 5 prospects are 3B Alex Gordon (Royals), SS Brandon Wood (Angels), SS Troy Tulowitzki (Rockies), OF Billy Butler (Royals), OF Travis Buck (Athletics)
Southern League - top 5 prospects are P Homer Bailey (Reds), P Yovani Gallardo (Brewers), P Scott Elbert (Dodgers), OF Matt Kemp (Dodgers), 3B Andy LaRoche (Dodgers)
Eastern League - top 5 prospects are P Philip Hughes (Yankees), P Matt Garza (Twins), P Mike Pelfrey (Mets), P Adam Miller (Indians), P Adam Loewen (Orioles)
Florida State League - top 5 prospects are P Homer Bailey (Reds), P Yovani Gallardo (Brewers), P Scott Elbert (Dodgers), 3B Ryan Braun (Brewers), P Donnie Veal (Cubs)
Carolina League - top 5 prospects are P Chuck Lofgren (Indians), OF Jacoby Ellsbury (Red Sox), P Troy Patton (Astros), OF/2B Trevor Crowe (Indians), P Jimmy Barthmaier (Astros)
California League - top 5 prospects are SS Reid Brignac (Devil Rays), OF Carlos Gonzalez (Diamondbacks), P Franklin Morales (Rockies), P Nick Adenhart (Angels), P Eric Hurley (Rangers)
South Atlantic League - top 5 prospects are OF Andrew McCutchen (Pirates), OF Jose Tabata (Yankees), OF Fernando Martinez (Mets), SS Elvis Andrus (Braves), P Carlos Carrasco (Phillies)
Midwest League - top 5 prospects are OF Jay Bruce (Reds), OF Cameron Maybin (Tigers), OF Justin Upton (Diamondbacks), OF Colby Rasmus (Cardinals), P Nick Adenhart (Angels)
Northwest League - top 5 prospects are OF Tyler Colvin (Cubs), P Shane Lindsay (Rockies), OF Matt Sulentic (Athletics), INF Emmanuel Burriss (Giants), OF Cyle Hankerd (Diamondbacks)
New York-Penn League - top 5 are P Jeremy Hellickson (Devil Rays), P Pedro Beato (Orioles), C Matt McBride (Indians), C Max Sapp (Astros), P Kris Johnson (Red Sox)
Appalachian League - top 5 are OF Travis Snider (Blue Jays), INF Billy Rowell (Orioles), OF Kieron Pope (Orioles), P Tommy Hanson (Braves), P Jamie Richmond (Braves)
Pioneer League - top 5 are P Bryan Morris (Dodgers), 3B Josh Bell (Dodgers), INF Hector Gomez (Rockies), P Sean O’Sullivan (Angels), OF Gerardo Parra (Diamondbacks)
Gulf Coast League - top 5 are P Clayton Kershaw (Dodgers), OF/1B Chris Parmalee (Twins), OF Gorkys Hernandez (Tigers), OF Chris Marrero (Nationals), OF Jason Place (Red Sox)
Arizona League - top 5 are C Hank Conger (Angels), P Jeremy Jeffress (Brewers), OF Cedric Hunter (Padres), SS Marcus Lemon (Rangers), P Brent Fisher (Royals)
Mike Emeigh
Posted: September 20, 2006 at 05:15 PM |
126 comment(s)
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Top Five:
1. Homer Bailey, RHP, Sarasota (Reds)
2. Yovanni Gallardo, RHP, Brevard County (Brewers)
3. Scott Elbert, LHP, Vero Beach (Dodgers)
4. Ryan Braun, 3B, Brevard County (Brewers)
5. Donald Veal, LHP, Daytona (Cubs)
-- MWE
Beckett's minor league numbers are better, but Bailey reached AA at 20, while Beckett was 21 (they're both May babies, so their baseball ages are similar). Bailey's been throwing more innings (not that many more, though) at each age level, and Beckett had much better command.
It's close. Over the long haul, I think Bailey will probably be better.
-- MWE
The FSL was very talented, especially the pitchers.
The questions continue about Mark Rogers (Brewers). He's what he was a year ago: one of the best arms in the minors, but still very high-risk. The watchword for young Mr. Rogers is consistency - or rather, the lack thereof. His shoulder injury (which led to a premature end to his season) isn't believed to be serious.
Jesus Flores (Mets) didn't make the list even though his 21 dingers led the league, largely because he still has plate discipline issues. He is, however, the best catching prospect in the league.
Matt Garza (Twins), Mike Pelfrey (Mets), Philip Hughes (Yankees) and Andrew Miller (Tigers) failed to pitch enough to qualify; all would have been highly ranked - Hughes and Garza both would have been slotted between Bailey and Gallardo, although Hughes was "very" close to Bailey.
Terry Evans (Cardinals, later traded to the Angels after being promoted) was tough to rank. He was old for the league and had never had anything like this season before; on the other hand, he's always been highly thought of.
Kevin Slowey (Twins) needs to develop another pitch to succeed, which is why he was knocked down several slots despite his 1.01 FSL ERA. Right now all he has is the fastball and command.
Some scouts think Ryan Braun might be able to handle CF for the Brewers (first I'd heard that).
Anthony Swarzak (Twins) saw his stock drop as his stuff wasn't quite as good as it was a year ago.
Blake Hawksworth (Cardinals) got few mentions. Mitchell Boggs (Cardinals) got several more, with a good heavy sinking fastball and a quality slider.
-- MWE
With all respect to BA, I think not having Flores in the Top 20 is nuts. How can you say this in the chat (as Cooper did), and NOT rank this guy in the top 20?:
Flores was the league's best catching prospect as far as a pure catcher. He's one of the only guys in the league to combine potential at the plate with potential behind it as well.
You have a catcher who leads the league in home runs AND is a genuine catcher, not someone who is going to have to be moved (a la Justin Huber)? I don't care how much he has to work on his tendency to chase pitches at the age of 21; that's got to be a top 20 prospect in the FSL.
Maybe I'm the one who's nuts . . . .
Like I said in #98...another riff on the theme. I've been working on an article about the seeming lack of position player prospects, which I will return to once I know for sure what I'm going to be doing for a living (this stuff is fun but it doesn't pay the bills...)
-- MWE
Also, it does seem to me that pitching prospects are always more common. I dont have time to check tonight but I seemto recall historical prospect lists being pitching dominated too..though quotes like this generally weren't all over the place in write ups
Hughes still needs to work on command of his fastball; he leaves the ball up in the zone too much. Matthews, BTW, would also opt for Bailey over Hughes, and mentioned that it was a tough call to rank Garza behind Huighes. Meaning no disrespect to either Matthews or Garza (who I really like), but that didn't seem to me to be all *that* tough a call.
Pelfrey needs to improve his command and his secondary pitches. (But for both of these guys, these are *minor* issues, not major ones.)
Ricky Romero (Blue Jays) was considered for the list, but his problems with his breaking ball and his inability to mix up his pitching pattern kept him off of it. Philip Humber (Mets) would have been top 20, but didn't have enough innings to qualify.
J. Brent Cox (Yankees) probably doesn't have the quality pitches needed to close; he profiles more as a setup reliever a la Steve Reed.
Gio Gonzalez (Phillies) wore down as the season went on. He has trouble getting much movement on his fastball because of his arm slot and his height.
Not from the chat, but if Andrew McCutchen (Pirates) had played enough to qualify, he'd have been the top position player prospect on the list.
-- MWE
I honestly don't know. I suppose it's possible - one thing I'll have to do is look at late-season splits vs early-season splits - but the broader problem seems to me to be that there just aren't that many *good* hitting prospects out there, period.
-- MWE
I saw this in the future's game, but the start I went to he had absolutely amazing fastball command. Did Matthews hear this from scouts or was this his own opinion?
Wow, that's really high praise. Mike, it must feel good to know the Pirates have a real blue chip hitting prospect for once!
I presume it's what he heard from scouts.
As long as the minor league and major league staffs don't screw him up - something which I think *is* a legitimate concern, given the track record of this organization.
-- MWE
It's hard to argue with the top of this list, although I'd have put both Braun and Votto ahead of LaRoche. People keep saying that LaRoche has plus power, but I have yet to see it. Votto's a lot better player than I thought he was based on his prior performance, and improved as much as any hitter I saw from the start of the year to the end.
I would have put Sonnanstine above Talbot and Lumsden, and possibly above Gallagher as well. I know BA's ranking consider both performance and ceiling and that Sonnanstine doesn't have a huge ceiling, but he took major steps forward this year, and it's hard to argue with what the guy has done in his career. I wasn't a believer before 2006, but I am now.
I probably would have flipped Montero and Saltalamacchia. I know Salty had injury problems, but even so I think Montero has more room to grow offensively, and I think he's likely to be better defensively as well. But they really aren't that far apart and I can see the arguments either way. Saltalamacchia is going to have to prove that this year was just an injury-related fluke.
I definitely would have put Eric Patterson ahead of Alberto Gonzalez, largely because Gonzalez still has some holes in his swing that I think can be exploited at the major league level (although he was miles better when I saw him late than he was when I saw him early). The question about Patterson is whether he can stay at second, or whether he'll have to move to the outfield.
-- MWE
I have always been a big supporter of Sonnanstine but I think Talbot is rightly placed above him. Talbot finally got a reliable breaking pitch (a slider) working this season and reportedly his fastball and slider improved some more after working with Xavier Hernandez at Montgomery. He could be a pretty good starter in the majors, maybe even a #2 if he maintains the course he's on.
According to Chris Kline in the chat, Talbot changed his slider grip once he got to Montgomery, which made it more consistent.
The point I'm making about Sonnanstine, though, is that his stuff is not *bad* (*fringy* is the word that BA likes to use a lot). He touches 92 with his fastball (although it usually sits around 90) and his breaking stuff does have quite a bit of movement. In the chat, Kline said that Gallagher and Sonnanstine were about the same except that Gallagher is younger and has a better curveball (which is what I think, although Sonnanstine's command of his is much better). The primary advantage of being younger, among pitching prospects, is that younger prospects tend to be more "projectible" (and likely to add velocity) than older prospects with similar skills. It's true that Gallagher is younger, but I don't see where that makes much difference in this case - Gallagher's not likely to add much more to what he has already - and if Gallagher and Lumsden are middle-of-the-rotation guys (which is what Kline suggests in the chat) I don't see how you can classify Sonnanstine as anything else.
I didn't *expect* to be impressed by Sonnanstine this year, quite honestly; he looked for all the world like the kind of pitcher who would have trouble getting over the AA hump. But he just kept on' truckin, and I like his future.
As for Talbot, I think his postseason showed what he is capable of doing, and the X-man (an underrated pitching coach, IMO - I hope he gets bumped up to AAA) did a great job with him. I want to see whether he can repeat his success at Durham before I get on the bandwagon, though.
-- MWE
-- MWE
IL had a sharp decline in offense in 2005, perhaps because teams were more willing to promote rookies into big league roles.
Elijah Dukes rated #11 (personally I wouldn't have ranked him at all, because I think that unless someone figures out how to get through to him he's going to self-destruct). He'd probably have been top-3 here, perhaps top-20 overall in baseball based on his talent.
Pedroia (#18) was compared to Eckstein and Freddy Sanchez (two comparisons that I've heard a lot). General consensus is that Pedroia lacks the range to handle SS but that he profiles well at 2B. No surprises there.
Josh Fields (#6) has made huge strides defensively, improving his range and his arm strength. He projects now as solid average defensively, where a year ago there was talk about moving him off 3B.
Charlie Haeger (#19) is believed to be the first knuckleballer to make a top-20 list.
-- MWE
I'm surprised to see LaRoche ahead of Kemp (who was ahead of him on the SL list), Young, and Quentin. I've seen a lot of both LaRoche and Kemp over the last couple of years, and Kemp's got significantly more upside. LaRoche is the type of player who might grow out of being able to play 3B and be pushed to LF or 1B. The torn labrum probably isn't serious, FWIW.
-- MWE
It's hard to get a good read on how a guy handles breaking pitches in AA, largely because so few pitchers have a good one. And you also have to remember that almost all of the games in which I saw LaRoche were against Carolina Mudcat pitchers, of which only one (Sanchez) had anything remotely resembling a consistent breaking pitch.
I can't really put a good finger on why I'm not enthralled with LaRoche. There's nothing to dislike in his stat line, he's only 23, and he's not really big or anything. I think part of it is that, when I've seen him, he doesn't seem to make a lot of solid contact (I see that his non-HR EBH rate is pretty ordinary). I also tend to overreact on the hype that certain organizations - most notably the Dodgers, the Angels, Braves, and Red Sox to a lesser extent - get. Not that I'm looking to disparage those organizations, but sometimes I see a guy and don't see the qualitative indicators that match the hype, and I wonder where it is.
-- MWE
Why is that so outrageous?
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