Robles is a beatt. Photo via milb.com
Now is about the time when you start to see a few of the more enterprising pundits out there releasing Mid-season top X lists. Most guys just do minors-wide updates:
- MLBPipeline.com Midseason top 100
- Call to the Pen /Benjamin Chase mid-season top 50
- ESPN/Keith Law mid-season top 50
- Baseball America Mid-season top 100
- Baseball Prospectus/Jeffrey Paternostro Mid-season 2017 top 50
MLBPipeline.com though has a fully updated Nats system top 30, including the 2017 draft prospects, and the list is kind of telling. Lets dive into it, looking at some of the new guys, the guys who are off the list, the movers and the fallers.
(Note: for reference, here’s my master list of Nats prospect rankings, updated to this MLBpipeline list and updated for player movement even up to the most recent trades).
- The Top 4 hasn’t changed: Victor Robles, Juan Soto, Erick Fedde and Carter Kieboom remain our top 4 prospects, as they have been ever since we parted ways with Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez (more on them later). Now, whether this will still be the case in a week’s time, when the trade deadline has passed, remains to be seen. Robles remains the #1 guy, the guy who I think the team is looking at to have a “passing of the torch” moment once Bryce Harper departs town, and remains an incredible bargain in terms of bonus-dollars-versus-prospect status ($225k bonus in 2014). Soto has streaked up the ranks: prior to the beginning of the 2016 season he wasn’t even in the top 30 lists; now he’s pushing Robles at the top.
- Six of our Top 30 are 2017 draftees: This was the point that surprised me, looking at the list. MLB’s #5, 6, 16, 19, 22 and 24th ranked players have played for about a month now in our low minors. #5 and #6 (the ones that are somewhat meaningful) are of course our top two drafted arms Seth Romero and Wil Crowe. The reason there’s so much room for adding new draftees though is…
- We’ve lost a TON of prospects in the last 12 months: Just looking at my master list, here’s the departures from prospect lists lately:
- Graduated: Grace, Glover, Cole, Goodwin this year, Turner last year
- Traded: Neuse, Luzardo this year, Giolito, Lopez, Dunning, Hearn, Schrock, Avila last year or last off-season. Dunning in particular was in our system so shortly that he never made it to a ranking list.
That’s 13 guys, some of whom were pretty prominently ranked and all of whom were mentioned here or there on various lists.
Now, how about the guys that are left? Here’s some guys who are really shooting up, rankings wise (and yes, some of their rise is due to the surgical removal of so many guys above them … nonetheless, these guys have all played well):
- Juan Soto: as mentioned above; MLB has him #2 now. A year ago he was in the 15-17 range, and prior to 2016 season he was a nobody, outside the top 30.
- Yasel Antuna: our big-money 2016 IFA signing is not disappointing; he had no playing time this time last year and was ranked in the 19-25 range just based on his bonus. Now? He’s hitting .300 as a 17-yr old in the GCL with nearly a .40o OBP (as of this writing).
- Daniel Johnson: recently promoted and it was well earned: Johnson hit 17 homers in the first half in Hagerstown (not an easy place to hit for power), made the all-star team, and got promoted. MLB.com has him 10th right now; they had him #29th in April.
- Blake Perkins: It looks like he’s finally getting the hang of switch hitting, and his OPS in Low-A is 200 points higher than it was last year. He has generally been in the 16-20 range of prospects; now he’s at #11.
- McKenzie Mills: the lefty Low-A starter has exploded this year; he sits at 12-2 with more than a K/inning for Hagerstown, made the All-Star team and seems ready for a promotion. MLB has him at #18 in our system; he’s never even been an honorable mention before.
- Raudy Read: he’s stepped it up a bit, hitting for some power and holding his slash line to respectable levels as a 23-yr old in AA (and on the 40-man roster).
- Taylor Gushue: also a 23-yr old catcher, with an OPS above .820 one level below Read in High-A. Never before ranked (at least for us), MLB.com has him 25th now. I could see these two catchers pushing each other and pushing the likes of Severino and Lobaton off the 40-man.
And here’s some guys whose prospect value has taken a nosedive this year:
- Pedro Severino: speaking of catcher depth; Severino has seen his stats take a nose dive as he repeats AAA; his 1.048 OPS figure for the Nats last September seems like a mirage. He’s still on the 40-man, and his reputation is more about his defense than his offense, but that’s still just a backup catcher ceiling.
- Drew Ward: Year after year, Ward’s prospect value drops. He used to be top 10; now he’s fallen to the 20-range. He’s repeating AA and hitting just .224; he’ll be rule-5 eligible this coming off-season but I can’t see saving him with a roster spot right now. If he doesn’t turn it around, he’ll end up in org-guy territory soon.
- Austin Voth: perhaps the most curious of our falling prospects. He was in the 6-7 range just a year and a half ago, then finished a full strong season in AAA. 2017? He’s struggled, gotten demoted, and struggled further.
- Jakson Reetz: he’s now pushed down to 26th, after routinely hanging out in the 10-15 range after being such a high draft pick. He’s basically been socially promoted by virtue of his bonus figure, having never hit above .230 outside of complex ball. He’s now backing up a guy in Gushue who’s 2 years older, but also has an OPS that’s 200 points better.
- Anderson Franco: what happened here? He was solid in rookie ball … and barely at the mendoza line in full season ball. Another guy routinely given top 10 rankings early on; he’s now just hanging on ranked #27 by MLB.
- Osvaldo Abreu: he’s moved up a level a year, now playing in AA, but his numbers have had corresponding declines with each promotion. He wasn’t ever considered a major prospect, but now he’s barely considered a minor one.
- Telmito Agustin: he couldn’t hack it in High-A and was demoted back to Low-A this year. He’s only 20, so he has time, but he’s basically out of the prospect discussions for now.
- Nick Banks & Rhett Wisemann: both big-time college program upper-end draft picks, both scuffling professionally. Neither now ranked by MLB whereas both had cracks at the top 10 of our prospect lists at some point.
- Joan Baez: you can’t teach velocity right? Well for Potomac this year Baez had more walks than Ks … and more walks than innings pitched. He’s now a 22-yr old in GCL beating up on a bunch of kids, hoping to get his mojo back.
- Matt Skole: he’s still a “prospect” remember? He’s 27, hitting .235 in AAA, and has yet to be called up even though the team is so short on hitters that they called up Severino this past week. I put Skole in here just to see if MartyC is still reading.
And now for some predictions related to our prospects:
- Fedde is getting called up and soon, and will exhaust his rookie eligibility before the season is over. The team can’t let Edwin Jackson post 5+ ERAs like he’s been doing for the last few seasons.
- Robles, Soto, Kieboom stay put to keep our top 4 in tact at the trade deadline.
- I can see the team cashing in some lesser prospects in trade though, perhaps guys ranked in the 8-15 range. Selling high on Daniel Johnson perhaps, or flipping some C depth from Severino, Read, Gushue, Kieboom.
- #1 prospect next year: still Robles; he’s not debuting until at least the super-2 deadline next year.
- # prospect once Robles graduates: It’ll be Soto. For reasons explained in the next bullet point…
- How quickly will Romero get to the Majors? Pretty quickly. I could see him ending next year in AA, then pushing for a spot in the 2019 staff. He won’t be in the minors long enough to get ranked above Soto. That is unless he turns out to continue his knuckle-headedness… at which point we’ll all write many comments about how we “told you so” for drafting him.
Did I miss anyone?
PS: fun trivia; there have only been eleven (11) different players to hold the title as “#1 Washington Nationals prospect” since Nov 2004. I’ll bet you can’t name them all.
