Baseball America Ranks The Top 10 Nats Prospects
Yesterday, Baseball America released its first Top 10 list for 2020, and (as usual) it’s a testament to the power of incumbency:
- Carter Kieboom, 2B/SS (2)
- Luis Garcia, SS (3)
- Jackson Rutledge (’19 Draft Pick)
- Wil Crowe, RHP (5)
- Tim Cate, LHP (6)
- Drew Mendoza, 1B (’19 Draft Pick)
- Andry Lara, (’19 IFA)
- Mason Denaburg, RHP (4)
- Yadel Antuna, SS (9)
- Seth Romero, LHP (7)
While this isn’t as bad as three years ago—when BA decided to rank Wilmer Difo despite having exhausted his rookie eligibility—but it’s not much better. Seth Romero threw as many pitches as you did last summer. Yasel Antuna played in just three games after having TJ surgery in 2018. I believe if Fred Rogers were still with us, he’d comment “Can you say, BIG RED FLAG, boys and girls?”
This brings us to Andry Lara, who I can’t necessarily fault BA for ranking, though it does have another one of their hallmarks: the more money spent, the better*.
* This reminds me of a conversation I once had with one of the douchebag sales guys at work: “Well, I drive a Jaguar.” “Where is it?” “Oh, it’s in the shop.” “How’d you get here?” “I took the loaner, a Ford Taurus.” “Hey, that looks just my car!”)
Lara was a $1.25M IFA from Venezuela who will turn 17 in January. He’s 6’4″, 180 and reportedly throws a 92-95 mph fastball, a “power curve,” and the “makings of a changeup.” The chat yesterday afternoon didn’t reveal much more, aside from that in a deeper organization, Lara would probably have ranked lower.
Otherwise, the pattern is fairly clear. Victor Robles (finally) graduated, everyone else moves up a spot, except for Denaburg and Romero, while Sterling Sharp and Jake Irvin drop out despite the former being hurt (but still showing promise in the AFL) and the latter throwing the second-most innings of the 2018 Draft class (behind Cate).
As always, feel free to discuss further in the comments.
First, thank you to BA for giving us something to talk about.
That said, 8,9, & 10 are incredibly dumb. How could a respected place like BA make fools of themselves like this.
The last time Denaburg was effective was in High School.
Knucklehead at 10 is a laugher.
So what happened to de la Rosa? He got off to a very slow start in July, but by August he was raking. Seems like he should be ahead of several of these guys.
I laughed out loud when I saw the second half of this list. It’s so much easier to be a “prospect” than an actual producing player! Maybe the laugh will be on us when Denaburg, Romero, and Lara are in the rotation in 2024, but, um, not a lot of folks here would take that bet right now. I’d be more willing to bet on Fuentes and Cronin, both of whom likely will see the majors before that other trio. (We still have no clue what the story is with Denaburg, but he was awful and then got shut down. He had arm issues when drafted, which the team downplayed. If he has surgery and essentially misses another season . . .)
While I do share the perplexity at the inclusion of Antuna, I will add that I have no idea who the #4 hitting prospect in the organization right now, if you discount guys about to turn 33 years old. The Top 10 Bats list is going to be challenging.
Their writeup confirmed Denaburg indeed had “minor” shoulder surgery after the season ended.
Lara has had some lofty comps pinned on him, so I guess I’m the only one unsurprised to see him pop in the top ten here. Of course, we’ll want to see how he performs next year, at which point this ranking will either look prescient or it won’t. Ditto Seth Romero 3.0 (or is it 4.0 at this point?).
Sao, I’m inferring that you believe, as I do, that there’s no such thing as “minor” shoulder surgery for a pitcher. As they put it in this story Kerry Wood came back from Tommy John but shoulder issues ended his career.
I know these prospect sites really get caught up in “potential” and draft pedigree and/or international signing bonus. But those mean very little until you’ve actually done something on the field. Several of these lists got carried away with Jeremy de la Rosa last offseason because of his signing bonus/international pedigree. He hit only .232 in the GCL. Now, if you consider that he was the age of a high school junior, weighing only 160 pounds, and hitting against a lot of guys who had pitched in college, that’s not awful. But there’s also not a lot of evidence to suggest that he’s the next Soto, Robles, . . . or Anderson Franco. If you want a young Latin arm with an electric fastball, and a pedigree, I’d list Adon well before Lara since he’s actually done something as a pro.
Is someone still a “prospect” if he will turn 24 at the start of next season and has yet to pitch above Hagerstown? Thus far, Romero has thrown only 47.1 pro innings, to the tune of a 4.37 ERA. (He has, however, posted a 13.1 K/9.) Also, no one has any idea why he wasn’t able to pitch in the later part of 2019, which nearly all TJ guys are capable of doing. (Work ethic lacking during his recovery? Wouldn’t be surprising!) Sigh. Cronin has a similar pedigree and stuff and is almost two years younger.
As I always say, I hope ALL of these guys pan out, even the much-maligned Romero. But I sort of find it insulting to the guys who ARE playing and who ARE doing reasonably well to assume that guys who aren’t playing (or haven’t played yet) are better than Fuentes, Cronin, Sharp, Adon, Teel, Irvin, Troop, Schaller, Bartow, Tetreault, Condra-Bogan, German, et al. (There are going to be some tough choices on the Top 10 Arms list, but that’s a good “problem” to have.)
KW has it right! Obviously the top 3 round “Draft” prospects each year and their age plays a role in their top ten prospect rankings. A high School player as well as JUCO Drafted players who have never thrown/hit a ball against a D1 or Minor League player is pure Projection. However, those 22-23 year old players with 2-3 seasons under their belt are proven pieces of the puzzle that I believe should be ranked higher over those types of players. For Example, Jackson Tetreault a 2017 7th round pick as a starting pitcher, outperformed 20 of the 27 first and second round multi-million $ bonus pitchers that played that year with a 2.68 ERA. He then in 2019 moved to AA after only 4 starts with a 1.23 at only 22 years old. Tetreault at only 23 has a 3 year Minor’s career ERA of 3.80, was the 2nd JUCO Pitcher from the 2017 draft to reach AA (#1 was Bowden Francis), and one of the quicker overall drafted pitchers in 2017 to get to AA from that draft class. 22 year old 2018 2nd round #6 Prospect Tim Cate, has a 3.81 ERA in High A, and some of those unproven Nationals “Pitching Prospects from 2018-19, have not done much or even played much. So where should #24 Tetreault really be, and why does he never get any props for what he has done? OH, I know, because he was not a top 3 round pick!
Luke. Ford Taurus a new mole phrase to jot down mentally for us readers ??
Maybe. The point of that story is that on that day (and many days) he and I were driving the same basic-but-reliable car, regardless of how much more he had spent.
I may the one lone holdout (except for the guy who did the BA rankings), but I still have hope for Romero. I get the obvious negatives: a) knucklehead b) injury; c) he is one strike away from being out of baseball.
All that said, he is still only 23, Romero was considered a top 5 pick heading into the 2017 draft. He is a 6-3 lefty with a mid-90s fastball, and the Nats have had success with TJ surgery guys. Nats will move Romero quickly if he proves to be healthy and has straightened himself out. Don’t be surprised if Romero is near the top of this list next year.