Farm Futures: Final Top 400 Update

The final update to the Top 400 Prospect Rankings is live and the team Top 20s and prospect ETAs will be fully up to date by Wednesday. My process now shifts to preparing for 2021, which includes doing deep dives on every prospect on the top 400 who did anything of note in 2020. This means that the top 400 will evolve over the offseason, but this final update is a good starting point for anyone doing their prep for which guys to hold next year and which guys to target in first-year player drafts.

Ke'Bryan Hayes is a prospect who entered my top-50 for the first time in August 2018, got as high as 18 overall in April of 2019, but generally hung around the 25-55 range for the last 25 months. I've always thought of him as hit over power (potentially plus hit and above-average power) with at least above-average speed (81st percentile according to Statcast). He played in some pitcher-friendly environments in the minors that suppressed his offensive output, but the reason he stayed in the top-50 was because I thought the power would eventually come in games. Well, he wasted no time proving that to be the case. This is an example of why I prefer players to develop their hit tool first and let the power come later. He is now a top-20 prospect and I could see myself bumping him even further as I work on my list for 2021 over the next 3-4 months.

Triston Casas gets a nice little bump up, thanks to a summer camp where he received rave reviews not only for his prodigious power, but because he also clearly put in a lot of work to show up to camp in great shape. The first base bump is real in dynasty leagues. There just aren't a ton of options at that position that people feel good about as their long-term answer there. If he were a left fielder, he'd be 5-10 spots lower. 

Jazz Chisholm's performance at the plate hasn't discouraged me at all regarding his future, as I didn't expect him to do much better in this first taste of big-league pitching. However, he has a 74th percentile sprint speed, which means he is an above-average runner, not a plus one. That's important to note, but to his credit, he attempted four steals in 62 plate appearances, while Jo Adell attempted one steal in 132 plate appearances.

Casey Mize is someone I was always a little lower on because I didn't see that fantasy ace type of upside that others did. I still thought he could be a very solid top-25 fantasy starter during his peak, and I think that outcome is still very much in play, despite a disappointing 2020 season. The good news is that his offspeed stuff is intact — he can still make hitters look foolish. I think Mize would really flourish if a team like Cleveland were in charge of his development, as he needs to maximize his strengths (offspeed pitches) and minimize his weaknesses (four-seam fastball). Even being lower on him, I thought Mize would fare much better than he did, but I don't think he's broken, which is key.

George Valera got a nice bump, as he impressed at Cleveland's alternate camp all summer. He is the perfect prospect to really benefit from this year's developmental structure. Last year he fell in love with hitting for power too much, but working out under the constant watch of the team's top developers will hopefully allow him to take the Hayes path of focusing on being a great hitter and just letting his natural power come. You may not face a nice variety of pitching at an alternate training site, but you also shouldn't be falling into bad habits there. 

I'm not sure how good Ian Anderson will be in 2021, but he's clearly a much better prospect than I gave him credit for this past offseason. I don't feel like my process was that flawed with him. His fastball command was simply bad in the upper levels of the minors and I'd heard negative reports about where his breaking ball was trending. However, I probably should have given him much more of the benefit of the doubt, given his age (22). Anderson's changeup is his best pitch by a wide margin, and he wisely threw it 31 percent of the time. I think he could maybe throw it even more while dialing his fastball back from 48 percent to ~44 percent. I thought his mound demeanor was great, but he also hasn't really gone through serious struggles at this level yet.

Unlike Mize, whose results and process weren't great but whose stuff and health are intact, Spencer Howard is hurt. I know he was activated from the IL, but he didn't pitch after Sept. 12, and it looked like he was pitching through something even when he was healthy. He simply looked like a different pitcher this year in the majors than he did in the Arizona Fall League — his stuff was much less sharp, and much less electric. When a pitcher isn't 100 percent, they're a different pitcher. This should be common sense, but people fall into this trap all the time in redraft leagues — when you draft injured Chris Sale or injured Justin Verlander, you're not getting them at a discount, you're getting a different pitcher at price lower than you'd get a healthy Sale or Verlander. This applies to Howard until he looks healthy. He's not the guy who was a top-25 prospect for me earlier this year.

Hedbert Perez, who is fifth behind Jasson Dominguez, Erick Pena, Luis Rodriguez and Maximo Acosta from the 2019 J-2 class, is the only player from that class who got an invite to his team's summer camp. He made waves there, hitting balls out in games as a 17-year-old, and is going to get a lot of breakout buzz this offseason. He has a chance to have plus hit, plus power and plus speed, so it might not be a bad idea to "buy high" in dynasty leagues this winter.

I was late on having Travis Swaggerty in my top 100, but he's there now and he's there to stay. The reports from the Pirates' alternate training site are very encouraging. I think he could debut for the Pirates next summer and will have 20/20 potential long term. He could continue to climb my ranks this offseason, as there might not be a ton separating him and Josh Lowe, and the Pirates have a more wide open outfield depth chart.

Josh Jung is ahead of schedule, as like Swaggerty, he seems to be tapping into more pull power to go with his all-fields hit tool. It sounds like he will reach the majors in 2021, although I could see him having to move to first base or left field, given Isiah Kiner-Falefa's hold on the third base job.

Leody Taveras hit .227 and had an 84 wRC+, but I was really impressed by his overall body of work this year, given that he was a below league-average hitter last year in the Texas League. His 10.4 percent walk rate was particularly impressive, and his .168 ISO was higher than any mark he posted in the minors. If we prorate his numbers for 511 plate appearances (the number of PA's Danny Santana got in 2019 when he went 28/21 for Texas), he would have been on a 15 HR, 31 SB pace. I'm not sure how well he will hit in Year 2, and he's not even a lock to spend the whole year in the majors, but I'm going to be drafting Taveras in a lot of 2021 leagues if he's going outside the top 250, just given the power/speed ceiling.

I can't wait for Bobby Dalbec to lose his prospect eligibility. He presents quite a conundrum, as the strikeout rate is too high for him to sustain success, but he also hit for absurd power when he made contact. I know that Dalbec was late to transition to being a full-time position player, but it's worth noting he is two years older than Austin Riley, who had a similar power/strikeout barrage as a rookie last year. I'll be fading Dalbec in 2021 drafts unless he is going outside the top 300.

Like Swaggerty, Jordyn Adams had a great summer at his team's alternate training site. He is a great example of a player who might be benefitting more from developing in a controlled environment surrounded by the Angels' best instructors rather than riding busses around the Southern League all summer. Adams has always had high-end speed, but his hitting was a work in progress and he hadn't really started getting to his above-average raw power in games, but he made strides in both departments this year.

The best time to trade Deivi Garcia in a dynasty league was a couple weeks ago. He is a more durable Adrian Morejon for me — a guy best suited to pitch in three-inning stints once or twice per week. He could be an excellent source of good-ratio strikeouts while chipping in a half dozen wins over a full season, but I don't see him being an effective starting pitcher who logs 150-plus innings per year.

Ryan Jeffers is legit. I think Mitch Garver would be a good buy-low next year, but I also think Jeffers deserves to split that job so they could cannibalize each other's value, as the Twins don't figure to be giving many DH starts to their catchers.

Garrett Crochet skyrockets up to 13th from the 2020 draft class. This could be a horrendous take in a few years, but I would strongly consider just leaving Crochet in the bullpen next year and scrapping his development as a starter. Let's say he is as good of a reliever as Aroldis Chapman, which I think is a very fair comp. What are the odds he would provide more value as a starting pitcher? Obviously if he develops into Chris Sale, that's a win for the 'develop him as a starter' camp, but is that likely? I say no, and that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, but I expect the White Sox to send him to the minors early next year to develop as a starter.

There's something there with Trevor Rogers. The ratios ended up being awful, but he had a 30 percent strikeout rate and is still just 22. I want to dive in a little deeper on him this offseason, but there are worse guys to take late-round fliers on in 2021 drafts.

The Oneil Cruz situation is tragic and I hate analyzing it with a fantasy spin. I considered removing him from the rankings altogether until this situation is resolved. I wouldn't tell anyone that they need to hold him right now, but I also don't want to overreact when I don't have all the facts.

Alejandro Kirk is very fun and I may have undersold him when I compared him to Willians Astudillo and Luis Arraez. There's more raw power there than with the two Twins, and if he wrangles 60-70 percent of the starts behind the dish, he has pretty clear top-10 catcher upside.

Daz Cameron, like Taveras, impressed me even though his overall stats are pretty bad. He had one hit in his first 27 at-bats but hit .333/.355/.467 the rest of the way. I'd be trying to buy low on him in deeper dynasty leagues. Taveras' speed is in the 97th percentile while Cameron's is only in the 78th percentile, but I think Cameron has a similar ceiling as a hitter.

I'm really excited for first-year player drafts, and the two prep hitters I'm hoping to score in the middle rounds are Blaze Jordan and David Calabrese. They are exact opposites, with Jordan profiling as a cleanup hitting corner infielder and Calabrese profiling in the Corbin Carroll mold. 

ADDITIONS

Tanner Houck, Keegan Akin, Ryan Pepiot, Brent Rooker, Luis Barrera, Shawn Dubin, Shea Langeliers, Sam Huff, Josh Fleming, Rafael Marchan, Anthony Servideo, Alejandro Pie, Owen Miller, Hyun-il Choi, Coby Mayo, Jose Pastrano, Parker Meadows, Tommy Henry, Cory Abbott, Matt Canterino, Alika Williams, Eric Pardinho, Jordan Westburg, Gilberto Celestino, Ronaldo Hernandez, Jared Jones, Tyler Keenan, Justin Lange, Ewry Espinal, Dean Kremer

GRADUATIONS

There are three ways to lose prospect eligibility: Compile more than 130 MLB at-bats, compile more than 50 MLB innings pitched or spend more than 45 days on the active pre-September roster. This year, however, MLB will do away with the September qualification, so all days spent on a 2020 active roster count towards those 45 days.

Among top-400 caliber prospects, this means that Jo Adell (5), Andres Gimenez (81), Daulton Varsho (83), James Karinchak (102), Kris Bubic (153), David Peterson (181), Tejay Antone (222), Bryse Wilson (223), Thomas Hatch (224), Edward Olivares (235), Adrian Morejon (289) and Brusdar Graterol (309) all lose their prospect eligibility. The number in parenthesis is where I had them ranked prior to removing them from the rankings.

I'm not overly surprised by how bad Adell was in his debut. That was part of the package coming into the year — we knew he had the tools to eventually be special, but it was more abstract than actual substance. I moved Jarred Kelenic and Marco Luciano over him, but that's it. I think it will eventually click for him, but he was as advertised as a base stealer and attempted just one steal, despite his sprint speed ranking in the 98th percentile.

Gimenez hit more than I thought he would and supplanted Amed Rosario at shortstop in the process. His speed is legit (94th percentile), so he could eventually give us something close to what I thought Tommy Edman would give us this year. The big question will be whether he plays against lefties early next season.

Varsho proved that he can be a 12-18 steal guy over the course of a full season, which would be great at catcher, even if he doesn't help much in average or power (he has much more offensive potential than he showed this year). However, he may not qualify at catcher in some leagues next year, as he had eight games behind the plate and 19 in the outfield.