NationalsProspects.com

The NationalsProspects.com Top 10 Position Players

As it was a year ago, there was a clear consensus on the top three bats. Even the WaPo beat writers could name them.

After that, it was like telling apart Hollywood’s leading men named Chris.

Including the honorable mentions, a total of 27 players were named on the ten ballots. After the dust settled, it was…

  1. Carter Kieboom
  2. Luis Garcia
  3. Drew Mendoza
  4. Viandel Peña
  5. Jeremy De La Rosa
  6. Leandro Emiliani
  7. Yasel Antuna
  8. Tres Barrera
  9. Israel Pineda
  10. Cole Freeman

Others receiving votes: Junior Martina, Jakson Reetz, Nick Banks, Justin Connell, K.J. Harrison, Jacob Rhinesmith, Gilbert Lara,
Jackson Cluff, Jake Noll, Kevin Strohschein, Andry Arias, Eric Senior

We’re five years running with five new players (Mendoza, Peña, De La Rosa, Emiliani, Freeman) and five returnees (Kieboom, Garcia, Antuna, Barrera, Pineda).

Antuna is a mystery to me, given that he had just three more games than I did in 2019 (though he did not go 0-for-12 with 12 K’s and 12 E’s as I would have). Likewise, I’m surprised Martina didn’t get enough votes to crack the Top 10 despite finishing with the third highest OPS among players below AAA (i.e. age appropriate to the level). Folks seem to have a lot of faith that Pineda will resume hitting like Raudy Read; we can only hope that he improves to Read’s level of defense at the same stage.

The voting was especially tight for the last spot – one (1) point separated #10 from #11 from #12. Given that we could only agree on three, this is bound to happen. If I had had maybe five more ballots, this might have been different, but we’re not after statistical significance; this is just for fun.

Next up: the pitchers. As usual, there are concerns about age and injury, which lends credence to the old saw that there are only three kinds of pitchers: young, old, and hurt.

18 Commments

  1. While Martina had great stats, he was 21 at GCL with just 4 games at Auburn so I didn’t really see him as age appropriate.

      1. Interesting how the promise of some of the DSL kids from two summers past has us singing Carly Simon Anticipation

    2. Same. If he can repeat his 2019 stats at any other level, he’ll immediately jump pretty high on my list next year!

    3. Swami staring into the crystal ball sees Kevin Strohshein having a break out year and bumping into position 4 a year from now. ….

      2. Here we go Scott Boras ….. Rendon plan A. Donaldson plan B Howie and O platoon plan C
        Maikel Franco plan D.
        Sound right guys ??

  2. James — exactly my thinking on Martina, that he was older, and if they’d really thought well of him, they’d have moved him up sooner. It will be interesting to see if they think enough of him to send him to Hagerstown to start 2020. Same with where they place Pena and Emiliani. I would be really surprised if they push de la Rosa to Hags to start the year.

  4. Oh, are we voting for pitchers now?

    1. Jackson Rutledge
    2. Tim Cate
    3. Steven Fuentes
    4. Matt Cronin
    5. Sterling Sharp
    6. Wil Crowe
    7. Carson Teel
    8. Mario Sánchez
    9. Karlo Seijas
    10. Ben Braymer

    HM: Austen Williams, Jhonatan German, Reid Schaller, Alex Troop, Gabe Klobosits

    To explain a couple of my notable omissions: I don’t believe in prep/international pitchers until they show they can perform in pro ball, which Mason Denaburg hasn’t and Andry Lara hasn’t yet had the opportunity to do. Seth Romero has a high ceiling, but he hasn’t done anything to help his standing and he needs to get back on a mound before I take him seriously for this exercise or, you know, in general.

    Overall, the state of Nats prospect pitching is far better than the state of the bats. Honestly, I can see any of the 15 guys I named, including the honorable mentions, having reasonably decent major league careers. I hope this is the offseason we start to see underappreciated prospects like Teel, Sánchez, Seijas, and Troop popping onto organizational lists.

  5. Sao — I agree: I see 20+ pitchers in the Nats’ organization with a chance to see the majors. From the bats list above, not nearly so much! I see one likely MLB starter (Kieboom), two with the supposed ceilings to turn into MLB starters (Garcia and Mendoza), . . . and a lot of young lottery tickets or rapidly aging college draftees.

  6. Gents : can we say that when you have won the WS why not push the envelope with some young kids in lower levels ??

  7. I’m a lot higher on Reetz than I am Freeman.

    Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of Freeman, but the Nationals clearly aren’t, and his AFL stint probably killed any small remaining embers of hope for him. He was drafted already way older than most other college products. Typically, these sorts of guys quickly rise up the ladder or get released quickly after if they struggle. Freeman, however, has batted well but been completely ignored by the higher ups, spending each of his two seasons playing entire years at the same level, despite performances that would merit a promotion. For an old-for-the-level player to not get bumped up signals to me that he’s the second coming of Austin Davidson, and even if he continues to hit well, the organization will never put him in a position to play at the big league level.

    Reetz, meanwhile, is a year and a half younger than Freeman and performing similarly well at the same level. Reetz’s greatest advantage is that he’s a catcher, and as Spencer Kieboom, Pedro Severino and Sandy Leon have attested, you don’t have to be particularly good to get a lot of playing time in the majors. Reetz has solid defence and his good plate discipline has finally combined with some other bat skills to make him look like a potentially “good” catching prospect. His line of .253/.370/.441 in Potomac was substantially better than Severino (.247/.306/.399), Kieboom (.248/.344/.346), and Leon (.251/.312/.362) hit in Potomac.

    The only complication might be that there’s two other catchers (Gushue and Barrera) above him that might block his path to the majors. Either way, I think the likelihood Reetz gets a cup of coffee at some point is considerably higher than most players on this list.

    1. Reetz was, however, repeating the level. His first full season at Potomac (2018, he played 26G in 2017 for the P-Nats) stats (.224/.342/.323) were worse, though he was splitting time with Barrera. The Nats probably should have bumped up Barrera instead Reetz in ’17 and let Reetz finish out the year in Hagerstown. Barrera was already the primary catcher for the Suns and in that final month of 2017, Taylor Gushue was basically relegated to the DH slot to make room for Reetz.

      Defensively, Reetz has always been like Kieboom (the elder, natch): solid but not spectacular. He throws better than Gushue and Barrera, and all three are the anti-Read (i.e. they keep the ball in front of them) and it’s pretty well established that the Nats will choose offense over defense when push comes to shove, even at catcher. I worry though about how they’ll mete out playing time in 2020. There are four catchers in the system that seem destined for AA and AAA – Read, Gushue, Barrera, and Reetz – and the Nats have been making them all except Read split playing time for the past three seasons.

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