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. All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. Hayden Wesneski is a 25-year-old starting pitcher in the Chicago Cubs system.
2011 Top 10 Prospects: Cincinnati Reds and Pittsburgh Pirates Short but not small, his lack of length and size is actually an advantage for Johnsons swing, as he can enjoy a bat path geared for power and lift without it being too long. It had exploded even further when he was seen following the pandemic shutdown, as he sat 95-97 mph and was touching 101 during the 2021 regular season. All Win Expectancy, Leverage Index, Run Expectancy, and Fans Scouting Report data licenced from TangoTiger.com. But theres big arm speed here and big riding life to Shims fastball. These rankings are now available on The Board on the 2023 Fantasy Rankings tab, where you can also see the Top 120 Dynasty Rankings!. His footwork on throws to second is clunky and variable, which often impacts his throw times and accuracy, but the pure arm strength is in there. He has a career .387 OBP but hasnt been able to actualize his plus raw power in games, driving the ball into the ground at a whopping 66% clip in 2021 and a 54% rate in 2022. (One weird scouting note: Peguero chokes up with two strikes, but only with his top hand, creating separation between his two hands la Kevin Youkilis.) The top six were already know from this list, because Fangraphs had six Pirates in their top 100 prospects. Hes now a career .303/.394/.533 hitter and has had meaningful statistical success up through Double-A, where he spent about a month toward the end of 2022. RotoWire News: Gonzales will join the Pirates' major-league camp this spring. He has an interesting long-term body projection and breaking ball combination. His two-plane slider has nasty, late break and his changeup might have late projection because his arm action is so clean and loose. 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. But the improvement on his slider means he could solidify a role as a middle reliever, especially if the converted infielder is able to re-establish the fastball velos he flirted with a few years ago. His multi-tasking fastball plays at the letters due to angle and also gets a groundball when located down, but at just 91-94 mph, its still a below-average pitch. Jesus Castillo, SS That makes changeup development, or anything that might help him deal with righties, important, and indeed thats already underway Solometo has begun to more heavily incorporate a mid-80s changeup into his pitch mix. Despite all of that, Priester took a hit in a lot of the national prospect outlets, dropping off quite a few Top 100 lists. Johnson was a well-regarded prospect basically as soon as he reached high school, and there were scouts who were so excited when they first watched him hit that they considered him a future top 5-10 pick when he was only a freshman. This impressive performance inspired his offseason 40-man addition. He fills out the bottom half of the zone with his slider, itself an impressive bat-misser, thanks again to Dombkowskis command. Unfortunately, he then lost the 2020 season to the pandemic and most of 2021 to a shoulder injury he sustained just 12 games into the season. Aspects of the offensive profile that made him exciting in the first place are still here, led by Pegueros compact but authoritative swing, which is especially good at punishing pitches at the very top of the strike zone. in the minor league phase of the 2022 Rule 5 Draft. He missed basically all of September and was shelled in the only start he made coming off the IL. Shim is a big, physically mature righty with huge present arm strength, creeping into the upper 90s. Here's a link to the Top 25.. Link to the Top 50.. Link to the Top 75.. Traded from Arizona to Pittsburgh as part of the Starling Marte deal, Peguero had been a top 100 prospect for the last couple of years, tracking like a plus bat middle infielder. His maxed-out frame is cumbersome on the infield, but his footwork at first base has improved a ton since he started playing there, and weve updated our previous DH-only projection. They all received. Martin has plus-plus raw power and a 30-grade hit tool, not enough for first base but maybe enough for consideration overseas. Thats hard enough to do for any batter, let alone one whose schedule also includes the grueling demands of pitching development. A few months later, the Pirates emerged as the word-of-mouth favorite to sign him; he inked a deal for $750,000 in January. Maggi is, by definition, a Major Leaguer. 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. Last year, Fraizers 2021 performance at Greensboro (which included 20 homers) convinced us that he had a chance to be a big deal, but his plate discipline was a big problem against Double-A pitching. 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. Triolo earned industry praise for his defensive aptitude and high marks for his baseball IQ and instincts. His chase rates were at or below league average across the board, further emphasizing the troubling command. 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 moved into a minor league relief role in 2022. Hes still on a path toward a glove-reliant bench role but is closer to having meaningful pop than he was last year. That said, it's getting harder. Eddy Yean, RHP The type of contact he makes is unlikely to ever lead to home run power commensurate with a true everyday player, but Bae makes enough stinging, all-fields contact that he projects to hit plenty of doubles and triples. Jackson Glenn, 2B. 1/ .
Drew Maggi looks to make Majors with Pirates - mlb.com DeVito is a bird of a feather that has flocked together in the Pirates system: a promising arm with in-zone swing-and-miss, but one whose unsteady command has prevented him from capitalizing on that whiff rate. Dombkowski is a lefty whose high-80s fastball plays up thanks to his low arm slot and excellent command over his above-average secondaries. Ercolani, an 18-year-old righty from San Marino, had a velo spike during the winter and has been up to 97 mph in the bullpen recently. His feel for throwing strikes would come and go, and hes only 6-feet-1, a little smaller than the prep pitching prototypes who you often see getting $2 million or more in the draft. More glove-side fastballs might help him set up his sweeping slider more effectively, as that pitch has good-looking movement but wasnt a dominant offering in college. Obviously the 2021 draft was the big one, and seven players from that class are currently on the list. Bins is athletic for a catcher and has a good arm, but his receiving and contact skills are both 30s. His swing decisions and ability to make contact out front and tap into his latent power improved throughout the season. This also may have been part of why the Pirates lost so many players (11!) If he moves to first base, this will become especially scary. We. 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. Those risks apply here. Pegueros pull-heavy style of contact leaves him vulnerable to breaking balls on the outer half, even ones that catch a lot of the plate. Righties get a nice long look at everything Solometo does, and he could be very platoon-vulnerable against big leaguers. An extreme groundball pitcher in a small sample, he allowed just two home runs in 35.2 innings of work in 2022. That creates backspin and carry on his fastball and big depth on his curve. Across his 94.1 innings, he racked up 111 strikeouts against just 31 walks, with a 1.21 WHIP.
Pittsburgh Pirates: FanGraphs Add 2021 Draft Picks to Prospect Board It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every teams list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. Flowers has pitched very well in the mid-minors (he carried a 2.88 ERA with Altoona in 2022) and hes been especially good at avoiding walks for a pure relief prospect.
Fast-Rising Blue Jays Prospect Ricky Tiedemann Talks Pitching After coasting through the low and mid-minors, he finally hit a speed bump in 2022, posting his first below-average statline as a 21-year-old at Double-A Altoona.
Fantasy Update: 2023 Re-Draft Top 25/Dynasty Top 120 Still, his tendency to roll his wrists over early in his swing, breaking up his attack angle, resulted in a groundball rate above 50%. 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. Every once in a while he will show you the power, and hes very good at hitting pitches out away from him to the opposite field with authority, but you can get him out if you can execute location against Gonzales, and big league pitchers often do. Not exactly on topic, but Id love to get some thoughts on the recently graduated Jack Suwinski. Currently, Kennedys best attribute is multi-faceted fastball utility. On Friday, FanGraphs released updated rankings. Top 51 Prospects: Pittsburgh Pirates by Eric Longenhagen February 24, 2021 Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Pittsburgh Pirates. In 2022, it garnered just 8% whiffs and 13% chase during his time at Double-A, where he spent most of the season. Hes already taken a sizable step in the breaking ball department in just two pros seasons. 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. Prospects Coverage | FanGraphs Baseball In addition to sending Bradley back to Boston, the Milwaukee Brewers are also sending two of their top-30 prospects. A much deeper overview can be found here. 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. D-backs Dodgers Giants Padres Rockies: Offseason Tools. It plays nicely with Flowers plus slider, and he has enough changeup feel to parachute one in against lefties once in a while. Lolo Sanchez, CF Luigi Hernandez, RHP. Climbing the minor league ladder often comes with offensive slumps, many of which are cured as hitters accrue at-bats at the more advanced level. It felt like the Pirates were slow-playing him a little too much after the pandemic (Nolasco was easily physical enough to go to Low-A in 2021), but perhaps they simply knew he wasnt ready to parse full-season pitching. Barcos long, low arm slot creates a flat approach angle, but hes not really inclined to climb the ladder and pitch at the top of the zone right now, instead living on the arm-side third of the plate with sink and tail. 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. Malone, a former first round high schooler who was part of the Starling Marte trade with Arizona, has barely pitched since he was acquired, and dealt with shoulder injuries in 2022. Pegueros lack of throwing accuracy from shortstop is concerning. His slot also helps generate two-plane sweep on his breaking ball.
on Twitter: "wNS9+ With @longenhagen Discussing the @fangraphs His acrobatics and creativity at third base make him a plus defender there. He has the talent to be an everyday player, but has to improve in one or two key areas (throwing accuracy, slider recognition) for that to be his outcome. Chen is a very advanced righty with a deep repertoire led by his plus changeup. His delivery has a relief-only look to it.
Prospect Report: Diamondbacks 2023 Imminent Big Leaguers He barely played in 2022 due to hamstring, elbow, and hip flexor injuries that cost him all but a couple of games. Neil Walker / 2B 5. That's nearly 30% of all their picks coming up as noteworthy prospects. Priesters four-seamer is divisive. Out over the plate, he has a tendency to stay inside fastballs and lift them toward the opposite field gap. He ultimately went fourth overall to Pittsburgh, and because hes a relatively advanced hitter with a mature build, theres a good chance the Pirates move Johnson through the minors pretty quickly if he hits the ground running offensively. His letter-high, heater-heavy style of pitching, like Gerrit Coles, results in lots of fly balls and he may have long-term vulnerability to the home run. Joness velocity and breaking ball quality (a power, mid-80s slider with vertical action) give him the floor of a really good reliever, especially if he can somehow throw harder an inning at a time. Here are the Pirates' 2023 Top 30 prospects March 1, 2023 Pirates' Chandler going all in on pitching February 28, 2023 Pirates return No. Top Prospects Team Lists 2022 2021 AL NL Pirates Top Prospects Reading Options Detail Level Data Only Full Position Filter All 60 FV Prospects 1. Anthony began writing over 10 years ago, starting a personal blog to cover the 2011 MLB draft, where the Pirates selected first overall. His 2022 performance deserves some age-related adjustment, but its possible we saw flaws in Pegueros game exposed by upper-level pitching. He appears tentative on routine throws and still isnt a sure-handed defender. March 3, 2023. Most of his swings and misses over the last few years have been on fastballs running away from him, but in 2022, he displayed a more advanced ability to poke the barrel at balls on the outer edge of the plate, extending his short levers in an effort to slap outside pitches the other way. He mixed in four pitches, with his four-seamer and slider accounting for 88% of his pitches, and the changeup and two-seamer bringing up the rear. 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. 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. His low-80s slider, which has late, two-plane bite, has improved considerably and is now an above-average big league pitch. He has a wide arsenal, including a changeup and a two-seamer, but tends to rely more heavily on pairing his riding fastball and curveball to keep hitters off balance. JP Massey, RHP Reinhold Matay-USA TODAY Sports. document.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", function () { As a high schooler, his ultra-low spin splitter seemed like the more promising pitch, but his feel for it has regressed. Cristofer Melendez, RHP Blake Cederlind, RHP As a wrap-up, the Pirates have. Hes poised for a big league bullpen role this season and has a repertoire thats deep and nasty enough that he should be considered a late-inning option. Nunez started 2022 at St. Louis Double-A affiliate before being dealt to Pittsburgh as part of the Jos Quintana deal at the trade deadline. It could stand to have more consistent depth, but the flashes are there, and remember that Kennedy is barely 18. He has now struck out nearly 30% of the time during each of the last two seasons, but hes still performed comfortably above the league average at each stop because of the quality of the contact he does make. Ke'Bryan Hayes, Oneil Cruz, Mitch Keller, Travis Swaggerty, Tahnaj Thomas and.
Nick Gonzales - Stats - Batting | FanGraphs Baseball 2023 Opening Day Tracker. Stratton, 26, sat 94-96 mph in 2022 and has a plus-flashing slider that he rarely throws for strikes. 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. The Pirates snagged him in Decembers Rule 5 draft, making him only the second lefty reliever on their 40-man, so hell likely be called upon for consistent use out of the big league pen in 2023. Opinions around Shim vary because he offers less physical projection than is typical in the international talent space, even for an older pitcher. 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. Thats a very walkable path. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. This was a four-year rookie-level player who had suddenly been added to the Royals 40-man roster after the 2021 season even though he had all of 32 innings above Low-A. 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. Given how good he is at third, it seems likely that Triolo will be a good defensive second baseman if given enough time, and hes a fine emergency option at short (Kyle Farmer has played there a ton and Triolo is about that good). Reports, tool grades, . They have Hunter.
Pittsburgh Pirates Stats | FanGraphs Baseball When Smith-Njigba takes a comfortable, max-effort hack, its obvious that he has big power, and his exit velo data reinforces the visual evaluation. He stayed healthy throughout 2022, throwing 70.1 innings, and was more effective out of the bullpen than in his late-season starts. Hes been up to 100 mph, sits 96, and has solid glove-side command of a mid-80s slider. 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. Drafted as a shortstop, he fell down the defensive spectrum pretty quickly but without finding a way to lift the ball and hit for power in games. Injured Arms 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. 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. Its a pretty big lost year of reps for a multi-sport player looking to get traction with the bat in pro ball. A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A successful 2022 pro debut (47.2 IP, 9.63 K/9, 3.59 BB/9, 2.64 ERA) driven by very advanced fastball command contrasts with skepticism about how Solometos stuff will play against older and better hitters. While he was already throwing quite hard, Ortiz came into even more velocity in 2022 and averaged 97 mph on his fastball, up two ticks from 2021. He re-emerged in 2022 as a 24-year-old at Triple-A, and had an offensive season commensurate with that of an extra outfield prospect, a lefty stick with more raw power than hed hit for in games, but enough bat to play a bench role provided hes capable of playing center field. Gorski had a nutty statline at Greensboro and indeed has plus raw power, but its tough to project a real role for a 25-year-old who struck out as much as he did at High- and Double-A. The timing of his surgery is more detrimental than that of the other college pitchers, as it ups the odds that he wont (or will barely) pitch in 2023. 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. After bouncing around many websites covering hockey, he . Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb. As of list publication, Rodriguez is one of just two catchers on Pittsburghs 40-man roster, and while its possible hes beaten out by a veteran non-roster invitee like Tyler Heineman, Rodriguezs defensive chops and versatility give him a shot to break camp with the big club, split time with Austin Hedges, and moonlight at one or two other positions before eventually seizing the primary catcher job. Gutierrez has soft, quiet hands, he doesnt tip pitch type or location with runners on base, and he will drop to one knee when he receives some pitches as a means of framing them. wNS9+ With @longenhagen Discussing the @fangraphs Pirates Top Prospect List You found it controversial, so we discussed it Subscribe & Listen http://linktr.ee . The Pirates have three of those 38 players, with Termarr Johnson ranked 21st, Endy Rodriguez 22nd and Henry Davis 38th. He hit his stride in mid-August with back-to-back scoreless starts in which his four-seamer averaged over 96 across a combined nine innings a high water mark for the season and a true glimpse of his upside. Jimenez has a very good sweeping, upper-70s curveball and creates plus action on a changeup that he sells with fantastic arm speed. Massey, going on 23, is a very loose, projectable college prospect from Minnesota. The depth-drive approach has extended to the amateur side of things, where the Pirates tend to spread out their bonus pool to at least a couple of over-slot prospects every year. Podcasts: .
Baseball America Releases Their List of the Top 30 Pirates Prospects He doesnt always look comfortable out there, but his speed makes him viable at all three spots, solidifying his role as a heavily-used role player even without the power production. These rankings include six Pittsburgh Pirates prospects cracking the FanGraph top 100. Yean, 21, was once a 40+ FV prospect in Washingtons system. His low, short-armed slot is like a righty version of Reiver Sanmartins delivery. Perhaps as an adjustment to deal with this issue, Priester now mixes in plenty of fastballs for which he pronates on release, giving the pitch screwball-like spin. Back with former Astros pitching coach Brent Strom in Arizona . He pitched five innings of relief over two games in early May for the Pirates without allowing a run. His arm action is very long, and he bends at his torso as he lunges toward the plate, allowing for more extension during his release, but also creating an uncomfy angle that adds stress to his shoulder. While hes played a bunch of shortstop, he is much more likely to wind up on the edge of 3B/1B than he is to see middle infield time at maturity.