From the left side of the plate, Rodriguez has an exceptional ability to rip his hands through pitches on the inner edge of the zone. 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. Roelmy Garcia, RHP Bins is athletic for a catcher and has a good arm, but his receiving and contact skills are both 30s. This is the case with De Los Santos. 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. Averaging Out the Top Prospect Rankings - Pirates Prospects Ryan Vilade, LF Dombkowski is a lefty whose high-80s fastball plays up thanks to his low arm slot and excellent command over his above-average secondaries. Across his 94.1 innings, he racked up 111 strikeouts against just 31 walks, with a 1.21 WHIP. His fastball remains in the mid-90s but continues to underperform in terms of its bat-missing ability due to its hittable line. Readers should note that taking an aggressive line with players like this has yielded predictably mixed results in the past (so far, so good: Kevin Alcantara, Marco Luciano, Alexander Canario, Jordy Vargas, etc. He can play a fine shortstop. 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. 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. FanGraphs Prospects. Carter Bins, C He missed basically all of September and was shelled in the only start he made coming off the IL. Hes different from Kieboom (lever length) and Kiura (simpler footwork) in meaningful ways, but that entire group (and Downs) has had issues with letter-high fastballs, which Gonzales often swings underneath. Sergio Campana, CF The barrel-chested Smith-Njigba has huge strength-driven power and a patient approach that borders on passive. Overall, there is a ton of in-zone swing-and-miss happening here. Pittsburgh Pirates Top 61 Prospects | FanGraphs Baseball by Handedness, 25th on the Pirates list at the end of 2022, Effectively Wild Episode 1966: Joe West, Young Man, Ben Cherington on Pittsburghs Two Top Prospects. All Win Expectancy, Leverage Index, Run Expectancy, and Fans Scouting Report data licenced from TangoTiger.com. A core scouting rule of thumb is to take the long view with catchers who have impact offensive potential. Injured Arms Lolo Sanchez, CF 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. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as our own observations. Counter to our past reports, his swing is rather stiff and some of Lopezs length makes him vulnerable to pitches in on his hands. 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. 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. His turn at the 2022 Futures Game gave viewers a glimpse of his heater/curveball combo, showcasing the carry on his mid-90s fastball in contrast to the vertical depth of the high-spin (2,800 rpm) curve. ago All UZR (ultimate zone rating) calculations are provided courtesy of Mitchel Lichtman. 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. His delivery evokes Madison Bumgarners long, slingin lefty arm stroke, and Solometos east/west feel for location is Bum-ish, but dont mistake this for a true comp, as Bumgarner had already made 24 big league starts at Solometos age. Priesters four-seamer is divisive. Hernandez, also 19, sat 93-96 in 2022 and has a good-looking two-planed slider, but a relief-only delivery and a mature build. Andrew McCutchen / OF 3. ago They do not like solemeto or Gonzalez. . His 2022 was not as remarkable from a walk and strikeout standpoint but it was still good, as he hit .270/.376/.418 with 38 extra-base hits (pretty good for the Florida State League) and 33 steals at Low-A Bradenton. Fangraphs Reveals Their Updated Top Pirates Prospects List His low-80s slider, which has late, two-plane bite, has improved considerably and is now an above-average big league pitch. A fresh start with a new org (he was a waiver claim this offseason) might help him find a swing that produces more power. But at other times, he had difficulty maintaining the velocity as the innings wore on, which was compounded by his ongoing command inconsistency. He was throwing as hard as ever when he returned but still got shelled, and was quite wild at Double-A before he was sent to Arizona to audition to keep his 40-man spot with Kansas City. He threw it 16% of the time (up from 9% the previous season) and induced a 53% whiff rate with this power-action, mid-80s change. Atlanta Braves Stats | FanGraphs Baseball Scouting reports were. If it does, he should be a 50, and that grade was discussed during the Pirates list-making process. 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. He has basically been the same guy since he entered pro ball, sitting 94-95 with ineffectual shape and a pretty good slider. 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. He barely played in 2022 due to hamstring, elbow, and hip flexor injuries that cost him all but a couple of games. His swing may look different in 2023 and prompt a re-evaluation. He clearly wasnt comfortable in center field during his brief time there last season, but he only played there once every couple of weeks and he isnt a firm no at the position, even if he is bad there right now. 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. To be fair, he was only about average in terms of OAA. Top 35 Prospects: Pittsburgh Pirates | FanGraphs Baseball His pop times are routinely in the 1.85-1.95 range in part because Endy has a strong arm, but also because hes almost always leaving his crouch before he even receives the pitch on steal attempts, which hastens his exchange. He has a short arm action, which aids in his command, though refining his location will likely be the order of the day upon his return from injury as he continues to work out of the Pirates pen. 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. The swing length and approach combination is scary enough to keep Lopez out of the 40+ FV tier even though he has this sort of upside. In 2022, it garnered just 8% whiffs and 13% chase during his time at Double-A, where he spent most of the season. Andres Silvera, RHP. 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. 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 then played for Taiwans National Team at the WBSC U23 World Cup and helped los Caimanes de Barranquilla win the Colombian Winter League and later the Caribbean Series. Alessandro Ercolani, RHP Throw in the visual twitch and athleticism, and this is the player Spotifys algorithm would recommend to FanGraphs if prospects were musical artists. He did not pass. 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. It could stand to have more consistent depth, but the flashes are there, and remember that Kennedy is barely 18. Hernandez sat 93-96 mph in 2021 and when seen prior to Dodgers list publication last season, then kept throwing harder throughout the summer and ended up averaging 95-97 and touching 101 while with Double-A Tulsa. The organization will be thrilled if . Across the 2022 calendar, Davis had nearly as many HBPs as he did extra-base hits, to which the wrist fracture likely contributed. The clubs hit rate on these trades per prospect isnt great, but the hit rate per trade has been better than that because of their risk-mitigating approach. Overall, the Pirates adding six prospects to their top 50 list is pretty impressive. Even with that in mind, any team would be happy to sign a teenager with this kind of stuff for just $750,000 of their bonus pool. Either way, he played over half the season in the outfield and was roughly average, which is much better than I would have expected after the reporting on him previously called him a positionless defender. His breaking ball is now a mid-80s power breaker thats up to 88-89 at peak and generates plus chase and whiff rates. So compact and short to the baseball is Rodriguez that he can wait an extra beat to diagnose pitch types, which enables him to make in-flight adjustments to breaking balls, spoil the well-located ones, and crush the hangers. You can see the power and athleticism in Davis lower half throughout other aspects of his game, and its an indication that he has the ability to polish this stuff up and control the running game. Quants and front office analyst types are more bearish, citing issues with Priesters fastball playability. Righties get a nice long look at everything Solometo does, and he could be very platoon-vulnerable against big leaguers. 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. and play-by-play data provided by Sports Info Solutions. 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. 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. Reinhold Matay-USA TODAY Sports. For now, hes lithe enough for third, where he has a shot to be an everyday player based largely on his power projection. The top of this draft class right now is LSU outfielder Dylan Crews, who had a big weekend. Eddy Yean, RHP 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. Not exactly on topic, but Id love to get some thoughts on the recently graduated Jack Suwinski. He spent much of the season leading off for Altoona, where he slashed .282/.376/.419 and stole 24 stolen bases. Shim is a big, physically mature righty with huge present arm strength, creeping into the upper 90s. Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports. A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. He spent more of his big league time in the outfield than at his native second base. If you want to read me wax poetic about that you can check out my end of year review. Reports, tool grades, . Scouting. 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. Play-by-play data prior to 2002 was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted Finding a great changeup (or maybe a split?) The high-waisted Lopez has a wide range of athletic/mobility outcomes that will impact where he ultimately ends up on defense. Pirates Prospects Daily: Bryan Reynolds Plays Left Field In His Spring The Pittsburgh Pirates are hiring. 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. Still, his tendency to roll his wrists over early in his swing, breaking up his attack angle, resulted in a groundball rate above 50%. 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. The recent track record of hitters this size isnt favorable, with only Franmil Reyes really panning out, but its exciting to watch Blanco take BP and see how loose and athletic he is for his size. Podcasts: . The powerfully built Kelly, 19, is a squat but loose righty who sits 93-95 mph and throws quality strikes with his fastball. Defensively, Nunez has transitioned from full-time third baseman to mostly first base, with a handful of innings in the other corner of the infield still mixed in. The component parts of a scouting, tools-oriented look De Los Santos frame, bat speed, and infield actions put him in that range, while the DSL data reinforces it somewhat. He was Rule 5 eligible after the season, and hitters who have performed that well at High-A tend to be added to their clubs 40-man roster, but Lopez doesnt have a crystal clear defensive home and his plate discipline needs a lot of seasoning, so he wasnt a real threat to be taken. None of his other pitches are above average in fact most of them are currently below average but Chen has plus command projection and a plus changeup, so hes pretty likely to pitch at the back of a big league rotation or as an innings-eating spot starter. Ricky Tiedemann is one of the fastest-rising pitching prospects in the game. He signed for $900,000 and barely played in the 2022 DSL. Luigi Hernandez, RHP. 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. Gonzales has begun to track like Keston Hiura, Carter Kieboom, and Jeter Downs, and his swing shares mechanical similarities with both Hiura and Kieboom. Harry Ford is one of the top prospects in the Seattle Mariners organization, and he is also unique among his peers. Both can be in the lineup every night because of Rodriguezs defensive versatility and the universal DH, and a more liberal timeshare behind the plate might help keep them both healthier and more consistently productive on offense. His changeup is deceptive against batters in both boxes, but in particular against righties, who have a 40% chase rate on the offering. DSL data is noisy, in part because pitchers there dont yet throw enough strikes or with much velocity compared to more advanced levels of the minors. Updated Top 30 Pirates Prospects List from MLB Pipeline Endy had an incredible 2022 statline .323/.407/.590 most of which was generated at hitter-friendly Greensboro. But given his age and the amount of runway still afforded to him, this was seen as a speed bump for his development rather than being of great concern at the time. Its bat-missing capabilities are limited to the bottom arm-side portion of the zone, where this two-seam-ish fastball tends to finish. Clubs like the Pirates arent making buyers trades, so they have little to no incentive to move a potentially great young player, which in turn means teams have little incentive to scout said player. 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. The site listed four Dodgers prospects on their list. Fangraphs' Top 42 Pirates Prospects Top 42 Prospects: Pittsburgh Pirates by Eric Longenhagen February 28, 2020 Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Cheng entered 2022 coming off an incredible season in which he slashed .311/.449/.492 with twice as many walks as he had strikeouts. March 3, 2023. Johnsons swing bears some mechanical resemblance to Bryce Harpers, especially its lower half usage and finish. Might the changeup develop over time into a plus pitch? Its now fair to expect that the current version of Nicolas will be capable of holding down a spot toward the back of Pittsburghs rotation by the middle of 2024. He appears tentative on routine throws and still isnt a sure-handed defender. 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. Thats something to watch as Jones continues to progress through the minors. He has above-average bat-to-ball skills and very little power. This time around, the Top 100 has even more Moreno types, prospects who combine . Isaias Uribe, LHP 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. Hard-Throwers . His size creates some stiffness and imbalance during his swing, which can lead to him putting suboptimal contact in play. Vilade spent some time near the top of the Rockies list due to his feel for contact. His slider lacks nasty, biting movement, but his arm slot makes it tough on lefty hitters, and his command of it gives it back-foot utility against righties. In cases like these, sometimes the things that initially pique your interest, like data and/or available video, are enough to excite on their own even as you acknowledge that the error bars are as wide as can be because of the relative dearth of reinforcing club opinions. Triolo has long been viewed as a glove-first third baseman whod likely have some big league utility, similar to D-backs third baseman Emmanuel Rivera. A double-plus hit tool leads the way for Termarr Johnson, a 5'7" 175 lb left-handed hitter who calls Jose Ramirez to mind on a quick visual evaluation. Hes on the 40-man roster and will likely get a chance to sink or swim on the big league roster in 2023. Pathways toward a more impactful role are most likely to be carved by Harringtons command outperforming this projection. Still right on the cusp of graduating from prospect eligibility, Kranick made four appearances in the minors to start the 2022 season before being called up to the major league bullpen.