Zac Veen

Veen has pedigree (ninth-overall pick in 2020) and will call Coors Field home one day, but his eventual statistical output is tough to project, even after he played a full 2022 season at High-A, Double-A and the Arizona Fall League. Part of the problem is that he was seen as a future plus power hitter when he was drafted, with scouts expecting him to fill out his 6-foot-4 frame, but instead he has remained athletic and wiry with fringe-average game power. He turned 21 in December and had a 42:14 K:BB in 141 plate appearances at Double-A (young for the level), juxtaposed to an 8:15 K:BB in 99 plate appearances in the AFL, where the pitching was notoriously bad. A case could be made for just throwing out his Double-A performance due to his youth and throwing out his AFL performance due to the video-game offensive conditions. Veen was age-appropriate at hitter-friendly High-A Spokane, where he hit .269/.368/.439 with 11 home runs, 50 steals, a 22.5 K% and a 12.5 BB%. Throw out the steals, and this seems like an accurate representation of where Veen is at developmentally. For years, the Rockies have given all their prospects the permanent green light on the bases - plenty of prospects you've never heard of have tallied 30-plus steal seasons in that organization. As for a known commodity, Sam Hilliard stole 60 bases between High-A and Double-A from 2017-2018. Veen gets plus run grades from FanGraphs and has an average run grade from Baseball America. He is a decidedly better base stealer than Hilliard ever was, but you should expect him to be a 20-plus stolen-base threat in the majors at your own risk. Veen will likely return to Double-A and could get to Triple-A this summer. Read Past Outlooks