Indholdsfortegnelse for October 2022 i Baseball America

Change is never easy, but in the case of the Minor League Top 10 Prospects rankings, the time has come to retire a long-time Baseball America fixture. The extension of the minor league schedule from Labor Day into late September has made it untenable for us to produce Minor League Top 10 Prospects content for the October issue of BA. And by November, we kick off organizational Top 10 Prospects coverage. This year, the Triple-A season did not end until Sept. 28, and the Double-A schedule ran until Sept. 18. At the upper levels of the minors, the season is now two to three weeks longer. In the past, we were able to wait until all minor league seasons ended—around Sept. 5—to determine which prospects met the playing time qualification…

Thanks to the introduction of Hawk-Eye data in some minor league parks, prospect analysts are able to measure particular skills at a level that no one would have imagined 10 years ago. Over the years, my process of evaluating prospects has evolved to a blend of analytics, in-person scouting and video. I’ve started to appreciate particular skill sets. These biases are noticeably prevalent when discussing hitters. I like position players with a well-balanced skill set: a blend of impact (90th percentile exit velocity), good swing decisions (out-of-zone chase rate), average bat-to-ball skills (contact rate) and the ability to be able to turn that into production. The minor league hitters presented here caught my eye because of metrics and in-person observation. No player highlighted here ranked as an end-of-season Top 100…

The first round of the 2019 draft saw Bobby Witt Jr., Riley Greene, CJ Abrams, Brett Baty and Corbin Carroll come off the board in the first 16 picks. Each of the five high school products made his MLB debut this season, just three years after being drafted—despite losing a crucial year of development when the 2020 minor league season was canceled by the pandemic. Joining that quintet was 2019 second-rounder Gunnar Henderson, the Minor League Player of the Year this season. As distinguished as those six young players are, not one was considered for our Rookie of the Year award. It was a different 2019 draftee out of high school for whom that distinction applied. The Braves drafted Michael Harris II out Stockbridge High in suburban Atlanta in the…

After Shohei Ohtani redefined what was possible in Major League Baseball with his unprecedented two-way performance last season, the only question was whether he could do it again. Ohtani, in no uncertain terms, showed the answer was unequivocally “yes” in 2022. Ohtani delivered another extraordinary season for the Angels this year, batting .273/.356/.519 with 34 home runs and 95 RBIs and going 15-9, 2.33 with 219 strikeouts in 166 innings on the mound. Among qualified players, he finished tied for eighth in extra base-hits, 10th in OPS, tied for 11th in home runs, second in strikeouts per nine innings, fifth in ERA and sixth in strikeouts. He had a streak of 31.2 consecutive innings without allowing an earned run, had an eight-RBI game and a 13-strikeout game on backto-back nights.…

PAGE 43 ● The White Sox made the right call in the first round of the 2021 draft PAGE 39 ● A young backstop could end the Angels’ homegrown catcher drought PAGE 40 ● The Rays believe the best is yet to come for Kyle Manzardo PAGE 42 ● The Reds’ top prospect proves his 2021 pop up was no fluke PAGE 43 ● A teenage Brewers prospect makes a memorable full-season debut PAGE 44 ● Andrew Painter looks nearly MLB ready for the Phillies even as a 20-year-old PAGE 45 Henderson Represents A Win For Development The Orioles have tended to prefer college hitters in recent drafts, but Gunnar Henderson is a notable exception. Baltimore drafted the Alabama prep shortstop at the top of the second round in 2019,…

As this issue went to press, I had just started my 20th year at Baseball America. That’s a lot of baseball. Twenty years encompasses more than 3,000 hits, 600 doubles and 500 home runs of Miguel Cabrera’s career. It’s almost the entirety of Justin Verlander’s college and pro career. The last prospects from when I started at BA are edging into retirement. Most of the players I remember from my formative years at BA are now coaches or front office officials, if they are still around the game. Jackson Chourio wasn’t born when I became a BA employee. I’m fortunate to have a dream job, one that exceeds anything I could have imagined when I was growing up. So thank you Baseball America subscribers for providing this opportunity. I am…

NATE OCHOA SS/3B | NATIONALS Over the last couple of years, it has been even more difficult than normal for Canadian baseball players to get scouted and evaluated Thanks to the coronavirus pandemic, the border between Canada and the United States was closed, making it difficult for scouts to get into Canada or for the players to get out to play in various tournaments. But for players like Nate Ochoa, the ability to consistently hit the ball hard in workouts, games and in the MLB Draft League helped him get on scouts’ radars. Ochoa is a 6-foot, 215-pound shortstop/third baseman from Burlington, Ontario. He rated as one of the Rapdoso standouts thanks to his ability to consistently hit the ball hard. The 18-year-old averaged an 86.8 mph exit velocity, posted…

FORMER BALLPLAYERS REFLECT ON PRO SUCCESS AND FAILURE Failure is a foreign concept for most high school first-round picks, and Devin Mesoraco was no different. Other than Tommy John surgery as a sophomore, not much had slowed down Mesoraco on the field at Punxsutawney (Pa.) High. The 2007 grad wrapped his prep career by winning a state championship and being drafted by the Reds at No. 15 overall. Touted as an athletic catcher with a strong chance to stick behind the plate, Mesoraco quickly signed for $1.4 million and reported to the Rookie-level Gulf Coast League. He then spent that summer learning a lot about failure. “All that stuff was very challenging. I struggled initially,” Mesoraco said. “You go to Florida and it’s a thousand degrees, and I’d never played…

In each season since its inception in 1981—save for the lost 2020—Baseball America has chosen a Minor League Player of the Year. We single out the best season by a prospect in the minor leagues, factoring age, level and projected future MLB value. The best Minor League POY winner in terms of MLB value is Mike Trout (2011). Right behind him are Hall of Famers Derek Jeter (1994) and Frank Thomas (1990), followed by potential future Hall of Famers Andruw Jones (1995-96), Manny Ramirez (1993) and Joe Mauer (2003). At the next tier down are players who were very good—occasionally elite—for a very long time: Dwight Gooden (1983), Jose Canseco (1985) and Josh Beckett (2001). AND THE 2022 WINNER IS ……

Last year’s transfers were the first to take advantage of updated NCAA legislation that allows players a one-time exception to transfer between four-year schools without having to sit out a year. This year’s group offered quantity and quality of options. 1. TOMMY WHITE, 3B/1B N.C. STATE ➔ LOUISIANA STATE 2022 Stats: .362/.425/.757, 235 AB, 54 R, 85 H, 27 HR, 74 RBIs, 1 SB White really needs no introduction, because he was a sensation in his first season in college baseball on the way to setting the national freshman record for home runs in a season with 27. He’ll immediately be one of the best hitters in the Southeastern Conference. 2. PAUL SKENES, C/RHP AIR FORCE ➔ LOUISIANA STATE 2022 Pitching: 10-3, 2.73 ERA, 85.2 IP, 30 BB, 96 SO,…

In 1993, Lee Thomas had the year MLB executives can only dream of having. The year before, the Phillies had been among the worst teams in the league, going 70-102. But in 1993, the Phillies completed a remarkable turnaround by winning 97 games and reaching the World Series. That team was built almost completely by Thomas, who had become the Phillies’ general manager in 1988. He brought key cogs on the ’93 pennant winners such as Curt Schilling, Lenny Dykstra and Mitch Williams to Philadelphia. It was a highlight of a lengthy career as a player and front office executive. Thomas had also been the farm director for the Cardinals in the 1980s and played a key role in the development of the 1985 World Series champions. Before he moved…

TRIPLE-A International • Pacific Coast ▀ Player of the Year: Miguel Vargas, 3B, Oklahoma City (Dodgers) Vargas was one of just 11 prospects in the minor leagues to bat 350 times and top these thresholds: .300 average, .400 on-base percentage and .500 slugging. ▀ Pitcher of the Year: Hunter Brown, RHP, Sugar Land (Astros) Sharper command made all the difference for Brown, who had the lowest ERA for a Triple-A pitcher with 100 innings. He made his MLB debut in September. DOUBLE-A Eastern • Southern • Texas ▀ Player of the Year: Corbin Carroll, OF, Amarillo (D-backs) The 2019 first-rounder hit for average and power, he stole bases and he played a dynamic center field, making him one of the most exciting players in the minors. ▀ Pitcher of the…