I’d be more comfortable with this ranking were he healthy, but Yerry projects as a No.
2020 Projections.
He was twitchy, projectable, looked fantastic at shortstop, and was old enough to sign immediately.
2019 Positional Power Rankings: Summary .
Indeed the Twins put Brusdar in the bullpen late in the year and had publicly declared their intent to put him there again this season before they traded him to the Dodgers (after initially sending him to the Red Sox) as part of the Mookie Betts musical chairs deal. Though his fastball touches 98, his stuff is so diverse that he never has to pitch off of it. We think he’s a .340 xwOBA guy who also plays plus defense at first, and while ideally he’d be a little more selective, we still think he ends up as a good everyday first baseman.Lux has suddenly grown into an enviable hit/power combination and has a middle infield defensive profile, though keep an eye on his throwing issues.Somehow, over the past year, the ratio of scouts who believe the 6-foot-7 Cruz might actually stay at shortstop has grown. We think it’ll be enough for Sánchez to be an average everyday hitter, and the Marlins have two option years to try to tinker with the swing and coax out more power if they want to. The offensive bar at third base has also been higher on average than in left field during the last four years.The Yankees are good. He can drop the bat head and yank balls out to his pull side at times, then lunge at breaking stuff away from him at others. Whether Miami player dev can adjust that without compromising Sanchez’s control and health remains to be seen.The .401/.442/.662 line Abrams posted after signing isn’t sustainable, buoyed as it was by the interaction that players as fast as he is have with defenses at the lowest levels of the minors (he had a .425 BABIP), but Abrams can absolutely rake. He’s never had arm issues (his 2018 IL stint was due to an oblique injury), and he has rare on-mound athleticism coupled with an understanding of how to pitch. Ruiz is a skills-over-tools catcher, an acquired taste some scouts like and others do not. Even if he’s not posting All-Star offensive statlines, we think he’ll provide All-Star value overall because of the glove.Put a traditional velo/breaking ball prospect in an org that suddenly understands pitch design and you have Rodriguez, an exciting young arm who’s rapidly learning new tricks.A year ago, on the Cardinals list and in our Picks to Click article, we tabbed Carlson as one of the prospects in this org likely to break out. He comported himself well during a 23-game jaunt in the Midwest League (.337/.427/.482) before he was shut down with a left foot injury that kept him away from baseball activity until just after the New Year. Again, Adell struck out a lot when he was challenged, and there are people in baseball who worry about how often he K’s, but he was just 20 years old and has had success amid many swing changes since he signed, a common theme among Angels prospects.Vargas’ name was often the first one out of the mouths of scouts who saw New York’s talented group in the DSL, and he was one of several the Yankees promoted stateside in the summer. He snaps off some promising breaking balls and has pretty significant command projection because of his athleticism. He’s short back to the ball with some pop, his swing is bottom-hand heavy, which leaves him somewhat vulnerable to velo in on his hands, but he’s selective enough to swing at pitches he can damage. The happy version of this story is Starling Marte, and as soon as the middle of 2020; the sad version includes multiple years stuck in neutral at the big league level, trying to argue that the upside and defense makes up for the big strikeout rate. He was making lots of hard, low-lying contact at Stanford, but since signing he has added a subtle little bat wrap that has made a substantial difference in how he impacts the ball. A physical transformation coincided with a senior spring breakthrough, which was then bettered by cogent repertoire work in pro ball. San Diego’s top five in projected innings were all prospects at this time last year except for Matt Strahm, who’d only lost his eligibility by a few innings. There is a gap between how many bats his fastball misses (he has 8% swinging strike rate on the heater, where the big league average on all pitches is 11%) and what you might expect at this velocity (Sixto averages 97, touches 101) because it has sinking/tailing movement rather than ride.
Sent back to Peoria for the first half of 2019, Gorman adjusted to full-season pitching and roasted the Midwest League to the tune of a .241/.344/.448 line, cutting his strikeout rate by eight percentage points. He needs to start several elements of the swing early just to catch fastballs, and he’s often late anyway.