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In some respects, its easy to assess DSL players. There isnt suddenly big power here or anything like that, but its the start of a physical step that was likely necessary for Cheng to take to play major league ball. Acquired in a. Thats the situation were projecting here. As the Pirates improve and fall into the middle of the draft order, opportunities to do this might dwindle since they cant create a big pool space surplus as easily, but their steady stream of competitive balance picks should give them at least some opportunity to explore creativity in the draft room just about every year. Dombkowski is a lefty whose high-80s fastball plays up thanks to his low arm slot and excellent command over his above-average secondaries. Even if sliders are a chronic issue for Davis, hell likely still get to enough power to produce better than the average everyday catcher. When Smith-Njigba takes a comfortable, max-effort hack, its obvious that he has big power, and his exit velo data reinforces the visual evaluation. Chen was the 22nd-ranked player on the 2019 International Player section of The Board and was generally seen as the best signable high school prospect in Taiwan. Its not a great look to lose half a minor league rosters worth of players in the Rule 5, but that whole group might produce one or two big league role players, which is a small price to pay if theyre byprospects of a bigger group from which the Pirates can pick and choose before exposing the rest to that arcane process. Hes not a great defender right now, and probably wont ever be better than a 40-grade glove, but Davis frames high strikes well and has plus raw arm strength. Swaggerty matched the nine home runs he posted in 2019, but this time, he did so against better pitching, in fewer at-bats, and in a much less hitter-friendly park, and he improved on his walk rate by a couple of ticks. Plaz had a cartoonish line in the DSL (he slugged over .700), but hes very burly and physically mature for a 17-year-old, so wed like to see him do it stateside. Scouting reports are. Garcia is only 19 but is already sitting 96. The 11-15 group consists of Jared Jones, Ji-hwan Bae, Anthony Solometo, Kyle Nicolas and Jared Triolo. He has now struck out nearly 30% of the time during each of the last two seasons, but hes still performed comfortably above the league average at each stop because of the quality of the contact he does make. . Top Prospects. Bins is athletic for a catcher and has a good arm, but his receiving and contact skills are both 30s. He was one of the younger players available in the 2022 draft and yet at a listed 205 pounds, Kennedy is more physically mature than most of his peers, even some who are a year or two older than he is. Still tracking like a high-probability backup catcher, Gutierrez set a career-high in homers in 2022 amid an uptick in strikeouts that his underlying data (just a 10% swinging strike rate) indicates will bounce back to career norms. Chandler started the 2022 season on the complex, where he showed two-way promise, slashing .231/.444/.654 over 36 plate appearances while annihilating opposing batters, issuing 27 strikeouts and giving up just three hits without allowing a run over 15.1 innings. The pitch has natural tailing action, but Ortiz can also blow it past hitters at the letters when he wants, and his TrackMan data shows hes mixing in four- and two-seamers in the locations where theyre most effective. Like his other stuff, his feel for location is better than the movement hes creating on the pitch. His arm action looks longer and looser than it was in his injury-shortened 2021, and his upper body appears more closed, which might be helping him hide the ball longer than before. Hes now 23 but could still be a fifth outfielder. He commands it consistently enough to his glove side to project as a starter. That makes changeup development, or anything that might help him deal with righties, important, and indeed thats already underway Solometo has begun to more heavily incorporate a mid-80s changeup into his pitch mix. If this were a high school draft prospect, you would already know his name based purely on how explosive De Los Santos is in the batters box. Defensively, he has mostly played second base so far in his professional career, with just a handful of starts at short. The FanGraphs prospect team presents their 2022 top 100 list . He spent more of his big league time in the outfield than at his native second base. Pittsburgh Pirates Top 43 Prospects by Eric Longenhagen and Tess Taruskin February 9, 2023 Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports Top Prospects Team Lists 2023 2022 AL NL Below is an analysis. Escotto, 20, was a 40+ FV prospect after his huge DSL season and later became part of the Jameson Taillon trade, but he struggled very badly in 2022 and needed to be demoted back to Low-A. Hes now a career .303/.394/.533 hitter and has had meaningful statistical success up through Double-A, where he spent about a month toward the end of 2022. He did not hit well after the injury, but thats typical of hitters coming off a wrist fracture, and a second IL stint due to the wrist was an indication that it was bothering Davis throughout the year. As of list publication, Rodriguez is one of just two catchers on Pittsburghs 40-man roster, and while its possible hes beaten out by a veteran non-roster invitee like Tyler Heineman, Rodriguezs defensive chops and versatility give him a shot to break camp with the big club, split time with Austin Hedges, and moonlight at one or two other positions before eventually seizing the primary catcher job. He would slot among Priester and Ortiz on this list had he completed a totally healthy 2022. RotoGraphs. DeVito brandishes a five-pitch arsenal headlined by a filthy splitter, but he struggled to locate any of his pitches well enough for them to really complement each other. Barcos long, low arm slot creates a flat approach angle, but hes not really inclined to climb the ladder and pitch at the top of the zone right now, instead living on the arm-side third of the plate with sink and tail. If you want to read me wax poetic about that you can check out my end of year review. After coasting through the low and mid-minors, he finally hit a speed bump in 2022, posting his first below-average statline as a 21-year-old at Double-A Altoona. Jackson Glenn, 2B. His swing is already geared for lift, but he doesnt currently have the raw juice to make the most of it. DeVito is a bird of a feather that has flocked together in the Pirates system: a promising arm with in-zone swing-and-miss, but one whose unsteady command has prevented him from capitalizing on that whiff rate. If he does end up having relevant chase issues, he might track like a left-handed hitting Brendan Rodgers, but Johnsons makeup and personality are so universally lauded that its fair to expect him to make relevant adjustments and become a key cog on Pittsburghs next competitive team. While it may seem like a lot of time has passed since he put his name on the prospect map with his otherworldly 2018 DSL performance, Nunez is still very young; hell turn 22 during spring training, where hes a non-roster invitee. Hes already taken a sizable step in the breaking ball department in just two pros seasons. He pairs it with two above-average secondaries: a high-80s slider with sharp, downward movement that garnered a 48% chase rate against righties, and an 11-5 curveball with a shape that mimics the slider, only slower and looser, which helps keep batters off balance and enables him to pitch backwards. Might the changeup develop over time into a plus pitch? His Adonis-like physique helps him generate plus pull-side power, and he will show it to you without overswinging he simply lacks bat control and breaking ball recognition. He has the strength to do damage the other way, but save for the occasional pitch on the outer edge, hes geared to pull. White was seen early and often as an underclassman since he went to a Philadelphia high school with University of Virginia outfielder Chris Newell, and would frequently match up against the Siani brothers during varsity play. 4/5 starter. Looking forward to fangraphs being wrong Campman92 5 min. 1/ . Terrero is a compact outfielder with a well-rounded skill set and strong rookie-level line. Theyre finding them. LSU played . Hes a good enough defender that hed probably being playing shortstop had he ended up at Arizona State, but in pro ball the keystone is Johnsons likeliest defensive home given his maxed-out, stocky build and what projects to be somewhat limited range. His fastball velo is up a tick since 2021, now comfortably sitting in the 95-96 mph range and routinely touching 98. He absolutely towers over his father, who was twice a Baseball America Top 100 prospect but spent most of his pro career in Japan. He was ranked 25th on the Pirates list at the end of 2022, but we were blown away after watching him on video and seeing some of his underlying DSL data during the construction of this list. The Pirates claimed him off waivers and quickly lost him to the Diamondbacks in the minor league phase of the 2022 Rule 5 draft. Pirates Reds: NL West. Indeed, of his offerings, only his four-seamer had a whiff rate above the big league average, and he struggled to keep that pitch competitive, only throwing it for a strike 57% of the time. He showed a velo spike (92-96) at the onset of the 2022 college season before his arm strength and command regressed. Hes on track to debut in 2025 as a starter if those issues improve and as a reliever if they do not. More glove-side fastballs might help him set up his sweeping slider more effectively, as that pitch has good-looking movement but wasnt a dominant offering in college. Hes been a fast-mover thus far and looks likely to continue that pattern, with a chance to show up on the big-league roster later this season, though a 2024 big league debut is more likely. Top 35 Prospects: Pittsburgh Pirates by Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel November 26, 2018 Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Pittsburgh Pirates. To be fair, he was only about average in terms of OAA. In April and May, he posted a strikeout rate of 15.9% and a walk rate of 14.5%; from June to September, he improved those marks to 28.5% and 6.9%, respectively. Scouting. Reinhold Matay-USA TODAY Sports. Stratton, 26, sat 94-96 mph in 2022 and has a plus-flashing slider that he rarely throws for strikes. Across the 2022 calendar, Davis had nearly as many HBPs as he did extra-base hits, to which the wrist fracture likely contributed. A much deeper overview can be found here. That creates backspin and carry on his fastball and big depth on his curve. For the second straight year, he allowed a high rate of home runs, which inflated his ERA. Pro teams are more open to east/west fastball operation and the Pirates might be able to coax more sweep out of Harringtons slider, though Campbell does a pretty good job developing pitchers, so there may be less developmental meat on the bone here than youd guess considering hes coming from a smaller program. If you split his season exactly in half, the improvement is obvious. Here are the Pirates' 2023 Top 30 prospects March 1, 2023 Pirates' Chandler going all in on pitching February 28, 2023 Pirates return No. The 2021 edition of this list featured some carping about Eric Longenhagen ranking Gabriel Moreno in the 100, because he was the exact kind of player who might not have been highly regarded in earlier eras of public prospect evaluation but who had all the markers of future success. Mason Martin, 1B Both feel like high-floored backend or long relief types who need to walk an atypical path to an impact role. Ortiz rocketed through the system in 2022, skipping High-A and spending most of the season with Double-A Altoona before making his big league debut across four starts in September and October. After spending most of the year at Triple-A, where he hit .289/.362/.430, Bae spent the last couple weeks of the 2022 season as an everyday member of the big league club, where he seems likely to stick throughout the coming season as a lefty-hitting 2B/OF. He hit his stride in mid-August with back-to-back scoreless starts in which his four-seamer averaged over 96 across a combined nine innings a high water mark for the season and a true glimpse of his upside. Pathways toward a more impactful role are most likely to be carved by Harringtons command outperforming this projection. He used his upper-90s fastball for in-zone whiffs, relying on his above-average slider as a chase pitch. Born Harrison Michael Ford, in Atlanta, 20 years ago this week, the right-handed-hitting catcher is the son of English immigrants. Given their respective shapes, its easy to see how those pitches play off of one another, and they were the reason Burrows presented a traditional relief look prior to his changeups development. After the season, he again played winter ball, this time in Puerto Rico with Carolina, where Cheng struggled. Diego Cartaya (37) - Catcher Cartaya is listed a little higher in The. He signed for $900,000 and barely played in the 2022 DSL. A proactive bullpen move could put him in position to debut in 2024. The emergence of a consistently above-average third offering reignited Burrows projection as a starter (he had been projected as a reliever here in previous seasons, in part due to injuries), and of his 24 outings in 2022, only two came out of the bullpen and just four were shorter than three innings. This also may have been part of why the Pirates lost so many players (11!) The high-waisted Lopez has a wide range of athletic/mobility outcomes that will impact where he ultimately ends up on defense. Hes naturally adept at framing low strikes because hes already so low to the ground, but its also fair to wonder if such a small athlete can withstand the grind of catching 80-100 games every summer. Aspects of the offensive profile that made him exciting in the first place are still here, led by Pegueros compact but authoritative swing, which is especially good at punishing pitches at the very top of the strike zone. His swing is quite uphill from the left side and he can tend to swing underneath fastballs up and away from him, but overall he is very difficult to make whiff inside the strike zone despite his steep-launch style of contact. Hard-Throwers Antwone Kelly, RHP But Jones athleticism and physical strength drove confidence that he could maintain plus fastball velocity across a starters workload in pro ball (which so far has been true), and his natural breaking ball bite gave him at least one likely plus pitch to go with it. This is the case with De Los Santos. Pirates 2B Termarr Johnson | 18 | A | 2025. It had exploded even further when he was seen following the pandemic shutdown, as he sat 95-97 mph and was touching 101 during the 2021 regular season. Harry Ford is one of the top prospects in the Seattle Mariners organization, and he is also unique among his peers. That's nearly 30% of all their picks coming up as noteworthy prospects. This impressive performance inspired his offseason 40-man addition. Prospects 2022 Top 100 Prospects. In most cases, corner-only outfielders who play consistent big league roles have better actualized their raw power in games. His changeup is deceptive against batters in both boxes, but in particular against righties, who have a 40% chase rate on the offering. His mother spent her childhood in London, while his father "a real Brit; he still has an . In his time at Bradenton, Chandler struck out 33 batters over 26 innings, and while his walk rate was an unacceptably high 15.8%, thats actually down a notch from what he was allowing over a larger sample on the complex. Youll occasionally see a low-90s changeup from Hernandez as well, but hes a relief prospect all the way and likely to stick in Pittsburghs bullpen despite below-average command. Solometo was a very high-profile amateur pitcher, drafted in the second round but given a bonus commensurate with the 24th overall pick ($2.8 million) as one of several exciting high schoolers who Pittsburgh landed with the pool space freed up by Henry Davis under slot agreement. Unlike the other lists released yesterday, Fangraphs has not posted their top 100 prospects list yet, so we didn't already have some idea of the top of their list. Jose Tabata / OF. Maikol Escotto, 2B Pittsburgh Pirates Top 10 Prospects Updated by Marc Hulet September 10, 2018 The Pirates system doesn't have immense depth or a long line of high-impact players but the big league club could. The depth-drive approach has extended to the amateur side of things, where the Pirates tend to spread out their bonus pool to at least a couple of over-slot prospects every year. RotoGraphs. Those games were taking place amid weight-lifting and practice for the coming football season and then during the season itself, so Whites balance of strength and flexibility might change as he trains just for baseball. That puts pressure on his plate discipline to improve, since right now Lopez is a little too proactive at the plate and might be exposed at the upper levels. He moved into a minor league relief role in 2022. Sergio Campana, CF Ryan Vilade, LF His defensive versatility will allow the Pirates to play in-game matchups that take advantage of Baes speed and ability to put balls in play. White was a multi-sport star in high school and after initially making a verbal commitment to Clemson solely for baseball, he eventually became a two-sport commit to Penn State to play wide receiver and center field. He spins the hell out of everything that leaves his hand, in particular his slider, which averaged over 2,700 rpm, but his inability to fine tune his command puts a damper on its utility (his walk rate was an untenable 12.4% across his 75.2 innings of work). Play-by-play data prior to 2002 was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted 2022 Pittsburgh Pirates Summary Stats Schedule Player Usage Depth Chart The depth charts found on the Team Pages are based on projected playing time, NOT the current status of a team's roster. His letter-high, heater-heavy style of pitching, like Gerrit Coles, results in lots of fly balls and he may have long-term vulnerability to the home run. Milwaukee Brewers Batting Postseason Stats 2021. Barring a velo bump or another significant alteration to some of the more concerning elements of his profile, he looks like a single-inning up/down reliever. Once-Loved Outfielders The depth charts found on the Team Pages are based on projected playing time, NOT the current status of a team's roster. A fresh start with a new org (he was a waiver claim this offseason) might help him find a swing that produces more power. Unfortunately, he then lost the 2020 season to the pandemic and most of 2021 to a shoulder injury he sustained just 12 games into the season. Neither his slider nor changeup is fully baked quite yet, but if either (or both) become viable, they would bring with them a higher probability that Priester slots in as a mid-rotation starter. 76. Top 51 Prospects: Pittsburgh Pirates by Eric Longenhagen February 24, 2021 Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Pittsburgh Pirates. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. 2 prospect to Minors camp after injury February 24, 2023 Bucs invite top prospects Davis, Johnson, Priester to camp February 2, 2023 Shim realizes first part of dream as prospect signs with Bucs January 26, 2023 Cubs pitching prospect Hayden Wesneski is proving he belongs in his latest Spring Training outing. Kennedys delivery is simple, compact, repeatable, and easy-looking, and you can project heavily on his changeup because of this, though right now he often gets underneath it and it tends to cut on him. We added RosterResource's Depth Charts; these reflect a team's current. Its unlikely hell make enough of an offensive impact to be a primary catcher, but hes very likely to spend time on big league 40-man rosters as a second or third catcher. Mlodzinski started for most of his 2022 season at Double-A but was called upon for middle-inning relief on a few occasions, and though it was only a handful of appearances, he was more effective as a reliever than as a starter. He has above-average bat-to-ball skills and very little power. His breaking ball has inconsistent length and he has a relief-only mechanical look, but hes throwing quite hard. Instead, Lopez picked up some reps in the Dominican Winter League, just a few games against the most advanced competition he has yet seen, and is poised to spend 2023 as a 21-year-old at Altoona. }); Grouped by type and listed in order of preference within each category. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every teams list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. An extreme groundball pitcher in a small sample, he allowed just two home runs in 35.2 innings of work in 2022. D-backs Dodgers Giants Padres Rockies: Offseason Tools. feels like the more realistic path to an eventual 45-grade role, or above. His swing may look different in 2023 and prompt a re-evaluation. He has a wide arsenal, including a changeup and a two-seamer, but tends to rely more heavily on pairing his riding fastball and curveball to keep hitters off balance. But he was then shut down and had TJ, which ended his season early enough that he could be back in 2023. Rodriguezs arm is comfortably plus. In some ways, this makes aspects of De Los Santos data even more impressive, because hes turning around soft DSL pitching with ridiculous pace. He will be an unmistakable fixture on Pittsburghs backfields for the next couple of years and is a power-hitting corner prospect of extreme variance. Not Quite Enough Hit Tool But theres big arm speed here and big riding life to Shims fastball. Its possible Flowers strike-throwing consistency will make a big league manager feel secure going to him with consistency in the middle innings, but on stuff he projects more as a near-ready up/down reliever. The average draft position (ADP) included is from Draft Champions leagues from January 19 to February 19 at the NFBC, which you can find here.These leagues draft 50 players and that's all they get for the year no pickups or drops. Johnson was a well-regarded prospect basically as soon as he reached high school, and there were scouts who were so excited when they first watched him hit that they considered him a future top 5-10 pick when he was only a freshman. Massey, going on 23, is a very loose, projectable college prospect from Minnesota. His command and changeup are both still works in progress, but his 2022 fastball strike% (68%) is an encouraging sign, and again, Jones has a special level of athleticism that should enable him to hone both over time. While prospect list ultimately isn't what makes a player great, it is . Jerez has above-average power and a 70 arm. Juan Jerez, 3B This was a four-year rookie-level player who had suddenly been added to the Royals 40-man roster after the 2021 season even though he had all of 32 innings above Low-A. For instance, hes struggled badly on defense, wracking up 46 errors combined the last two seasons. Even though he was sitting 96-98 in Arizona, Webbs fastball doesnt play like an upper-90s pitch right now, and his mid-80s breaking ball quality is highly variable (lots of 30s, some 50s). Barco is a low-slot lefty with advanced command and several underlying pitch traits that give clubs hope of more upside even though he looks like a lower-variance backend starter prospect on the surface. Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Pittsburgh Pirates. The top of this draft class right now is LSU outfielder Dylan Crews, who had a big weekend. His arm action is very long, and he bends at his torso as he lunges toward the plate, allowing for more extension during his release, but also creating an uncomfy angle that adds stress to his shoulder. ago They do not like solemeto or Gonzalez. He is a 6-foot-5 20-year-old, after all. Nolasco had two years of surface-level statistical success in rookie ball and the huge exit velos to match, but now after three pro seasons, his strikeout rates show a troubling upward trend. On Friday, FanGraphs released updated rankings. Drafted as a shortstop, he fell down the defensive spectrum pretty quickly but without finding a way to lift the ball and hit for power in games. Spending all season at Triple-A, he put up decent numbers, striking out roughly a quarter of opposing batters and allowing just four homers all season. Signed as an undrafted free agent in 2021, the 25-year-old right-hander has a degree in microbiology and premedical studies from Oxford, Ohio's Miami University, and he has worked as a . Hayden Wesneski is a 25-year-old starting pitcher in the Chicago Cubs system. Jesus Castillo, SS He was promoted to Bradenton and fell into a rhythm where each pitching appearance was buttressed by an off day before and after it, with the 19-year-old DHing in the intervening days. The Pirates got a deal done for a cool million, nearly twice the slot amount in the fourth round. He has become meaningfully stronger over the last year and has more of a balanced, low-ball swing now, as opposed to the slash-and-dash style of contact in his pro debut. He seems able to make some mid at-bat adjustments to this type of pitch but then ends up playing a guessing game with breaking balls. His slow, mid-70s curveball is easy to identify out of his hand, but it has lovely shape and depth of break, so perhaps it can be sculpted into a more traditional big league breaking ball. Format = Team Position Player | Age on 4/1/23 | Highest level played | ETA. Still, the teenage pitcher demo is bust-prone and, anecdotally, this seems especially true when the prospect in question already throws really hard at age 17 or 18. FanGraphs Prospects. Opinions around Shim vary because he offers less physical projection than is typical in the international talent space, even for an older pitcher. Theyve tripled since his claim-staking 2019 DSL season and Nolsaco Kd at a whopping 34% rate in the 2022 Florida State League. Endy had an incredible 2022 statline .323/.407/.590 most of which was generated at hitter-friendly Greensboro. The Pirates have three of those 38 players, with Termarr Johnson ranked 21st, Endy Rodriguez 22nd and Henry Davis 38th. His slider has a sweeping horizontal shape, but his inability to locate it has hampered its utility. De Los Santos contact metrics are a hair south of average, and thats the biggest indicator that theres real risk here, but boy, there is also real ceiling. While likely of low impact, Solometos feel to pitch will almost certainly enable him to be a big leaguer of some kind, either a backend starter or long reliever. Still 17 years old as of initial list publication, De Los Santos DSL barrel rate (its more a proxy for a barrel rate the exit velo and launch benchmarks arent exactly the same as Statcasts Barrels, but its the same idea) is so high that it actually breaks an age-adjusted 20-80 scale, grading out as an 83. Meanwhile, put on the tape, limited though it may be, and youll see an explosive young athlete with a prototypical baseball frame and premium bat speed, sizzling line drives all over the field. For now, hes lithe enough for third, where he has a shot to be an everyday player based largely on his power projection. Besides Johnson and Harrington, two other 2022 draft picks made the top 30. This time around, the Top 100 has even more Moreno types, prospects who combine . These rankings include six Pittsburgh Pirates prospects cracking the FanGraph top 100. He finished 2022 at Altoona and has a chance to be in the big leagues at some point this season. Triolos swing and footwork in the box make him vulnerable in a couple of obvious ways (high heat, sliders away), and we dont think the 60-grade hit, 45-grade power profile that he has put on paper so far will hold quite that much water against big league arms. The site listed four Dodgers prospects on their list. Updated: Saturday, March 4, 2023 4:51 PM ET, Park Factors He still has a pretty exciting hit/power combination for a player his age, showing a proclivity for big contact to dead center and the opposite-field gap, the latter in part due to his length, which causes him to be late. There were some signs of offensive progress in 2022. Bolton was able to stay healthy for the entirety of 2022, which was an accomplishment in itself given that his professional career has been plagued by injury since it began. He can play a fine shortstop. He stayed healthy throughout 2022, throwing 70.1 innings, and was more effective out of the bullpen than in his late-season starts. His slot also helps generate two-plane sweep on his breaking ball. A 2022 eighth rounder, Nielsens velocity has been up and down depending on when hes been seen, peaking at 94 in 2022 but at 96 in years prior. Pre-draft rumors pegged Kennedy as a tough sign given a strong commitment to LSU. The older brother of Ohio State wide receiver phenom Jaxson Smith-Njigba, Canaan is another of the many prospects acquired from the Yankees for Jameson Taillon.