This is the second part of Stat Scouting the Farm. Last time, I talked about the arms. The point of this exercise is to dig up lesser-heralded prospects who were positive statistical outliers, and then conduct some surface-level research on them to see what's under the hood. Here is a recap of the method:
Essentially, we sort minor league teams and leagues by production (think wRC+ or FIP), statistical indicators like K-BB% and ISO, and other things we know are objectively important like age vs. level. Then we pull names off the top of the pile and haphazardly research what underlies their production. The point here isn’t to repeat flattering information about the prospects we’re all already excited about, so we’ll also be ignoring list-toppers like Vlad and Bo; as well as guys already getting enough attention due to their statistics like Kevin Smith. We’re trying to dig deeper here.
AAA / AA
Nobody in Buffalo or New Hampshire who is not already on your list jumps off the page to me. I do think just how good Danny Jansen was in AAA is worth mentioning – he was the 7th best hitter in all of AAA with at least 300 PA. That’s extremely good for a 23-year-old playing a premium position, and some of the players ahead of him were older AAAA varieties who barely count, like Jabari Blash.
Hat tip to Jon Berti for demolishing AA in his Blue Jays organizational send-off with a 150 wRC+ in AA as a man amongst boys.
If you’re sick of people telling you Cavan Biggio whiffs too much and you want one extremely cherry-picked historic AA hitting comparison, check out 2016 Matt Chapman, who walked and struck out at 11.7% and 29.2% clips respectively while hitting for big power in AA. Biggio had 17.8% and 26.3% marks, so slightly better than the 2018 AL MVP candidate, with an ISO only 0.029 points lower.
Domestic Rookie Ball
Cal Stevenson
Last year, Ryan Noda destroyed the Appalachian League with a 190 wRC+ to pace all hitters. This year, Cal Stevenson managed to repeat the feat for Bluefield, with a 173 wRC+. Fun fact: the only two Appalachian League hitters ever with 200+ PA and a BB% over 21 are Noda in 2017 (21.4%) and Stevenson this year (21.3%). I can't help but compare the two. The fact that Stevenson paired that exceptional walk rate with a sublime 8.4% strikeout rate is extraordinary, and separates him from Noda, who is content to K over 20% of the time.
Stevenson did not hit for Noda's power and really, they are very different players. Stevenson swiped 20 bags and scouting reports identify plus speed and someone who is at least a legitimate defensive corner outfielder, whereas Noda is already playing 1B so he will sink or swim entirely based on the bat. It's also important to note that Stevenson was a senior in his 2018 draft year while Noda was a traditional junior, so Stevenson's Bluefield production came at an older age. These aren't the type of numbers you can just wave away based on a senior being in rookie ball though, so remember this guy. Cal Stevenson will certainly be in full-season ball next season, and, with a strong year, could reasonably be leap-frogging bonus babies like Warmoth or Conine on sensible Blue Jays prospect lists.
Alejandro Kirk
Cal Stevenson might have been the most interesting man in Bluefield, but Alejandro Kirk also has a claim. There were 33 players in the Appalachian league aged 19 or younger to get 150+ PA. Only five of these players had a wRC+ of 150 or better: Wander Franco (a phenom), Nolan Gorman (first rounder), Luis Santana (a really fun deep-leagues prospect in the Altuve mould), and Leandro Cedeno (a RHB 1B prospect who has apparently been tracked with 110+ mph exit velocities). Kirk's BB% was good (13.5), his K rate was fantastic (just 8.6%) and he also slugged a bit with a .204 ISO. This guy also played more than half his games at catcher, so you can ostensibly throw a premium position into the mix.
I say "ostensibly" because Kirk has a baaaaaad body and scouts probably project him as a DH defensively if they don't just outright ignore him. He is listed at 5'9", 220 but from the videos of him I would guess that 5'8", 240 would be more accurate. I'm not sure how much we should care about a 19 year old catching prospect's body though, for two reasons: 1) lots of MLB catchers play fat, and 2) he has years on the farm to develop that body. When projecting a 19 year old's body most of it is going to come down to the mental side of things, so we are in the dark here, at least until Baseball Prospectus decides to develop some new fancy stat called GRIT or something like that. Point being, I won't write off a 19-year-old catcher prospect for being fat and therefore Kirk is very intriguing in my books.
Hagen Danner
Alejandro Kirk's catching partner in Bluefield, Danner would normally be exempt from purview under an exercise like this on the basis of being a 2nd round pick in 2017, but his disastrous debut in the GCL (32 wRC+) brought him down enough to seem like an underdog now. Danner rode a fabulous walk rate (14.6%) to an OBP over .400 and a 128 wRC+ in Bluefield – very good numbers for a 19 year old catching prospect. He did strikeout an awful lot – over 25% of the time – and injuries limited his playing time and resulted in the hefty Kirk actually catching a lot more than Danner, but Danner has the pedigree and tools that Kirk lacks.
Gabriel Moreno
Another catcher! The 18 year old Moreno split time between the GCL and Bluefield in 2018, and while he was pedestrian in the Appalachian League, he was a stud in the GCL. His 204 wRC+ was kilometers ahead of the next best player to get at least 50 PA. Moreno only walked 5 times in his 101 PA, but he also only struck out 7 times for an uber-elite 6.9% K rate, and his 16 XBH informed a nice .239 ISO.
Moreno did make BA's GCL top 20 prospects list where his hit tool, power potential, and athleticism and arm behind the plate are all described favourably. He seems like a real one. He also shares a name with a Mexican gangster formerly accused of a gruesome baseball bat murder, which is a thing that I think is worth noting.
A-
Otto Lopez
Otto is the only Vancouver Canadian worth mentioning. He was the 12th-youngest player in the NWL to get 150+ PA, and he produced a 134 wRC+ in the process. Otto walked more than he struck out, which is always a good indicator (12.6% vs. 10.2%). This guy played SS, 2B, 3B, LF, CF, and RF this year and he has been described as a "high-energy athlete who can play almost any position... more contact-oriented, utility-type fit presently with a chance for better."
Without any actual scouting reports, we can assume for now that Lopez has plus speed and defensive value based on his positions played and rudimentary measures like his stolen base total and Spd score on FanGraphs (an outdated metric that nonetheless has him in the top portion of the NWL). With those assumed tools supporting the obvious hitting ability, there is a bit to like here.
A
Ryan Noda
Noda might be a total stud, or the next guy to break your heart in dynasty baseball. I've already touched on him under Cal Stevenson, and Noda is already creeping onto Blue Jays top 20/30 prospects lists, so I won't spend many words here other than to say that he was the best qualified hitter in A ball in 2018 and you should get irrationally excited about him; Noda might be the New Matt Olson.
Chavez Young
Chavez was the 15th best qualified A ball hitter in 2018 with a 129 wRC+, belied by acceptable but not outstanding walk, contact and power numbers that underscored a .285/.363/.445 slash line. At 20 years old ,Young was age-appropriate for the level. One number that really jumps off the page is the 44 SB in 57 attempts; Chavez nearly lead A ball in swipes. Scouting reports on Chavez conflict: earlier this year Longenhagen said he has "above-average raw pull power from the right side..." and is an "average straight-line runner" whereas 2080's Adam McInturff gave him a 65 run and 45 raw power. Longenhagen knocked him for lacking bat control and being strikeout prone, which really makes no sense in light of his 2018 statistics.
Putting it all together in light of his actual production, this seems like a very interesting switch-hitting CF prospect who has plus speed, demonstrable hitting ability, and perhaps sneaky power.
Cullen Large
It doesn't count, but if you filter A ball hitters by those with just 100+ PA, Cullen Large's 177 wRC+ is near the top of the list. Unfortunately he lost nearly 80% of his season due to some injury of which I had trouble uncovering the details. Reports on Cullen were lukewarm at best coming out of the draft - describing an infielder who could hit but had no standout tools - but the Jays gave the guy over $300,000 so they clearly thought there was something to work with. What intrigues me most about his limited 2018 numbers is the .253 ISO from a guy who did not hit one HR the previous season in Vancouver. The walk rate of 11.6% was very good and the K rate of 16.1% is great for someone hitting for power.
We'll (hopefully) see how stable those numbers were come 2019, but there are hints of Cavan Biggio here, who the Blue Jays took in the same round one year before Large. It's strange to see Toronto actually developing hitting prospects, isn't it?
A+
Dunedin did not have any real Stat Scouting darlings, but there were an abnormal amount of guys who were close for one reason or another so I'll touch (on) 'em all. Full disclosure, some of these guys really aren't MLB prospects.
Brock Lundquist
Lundquist was promoted to Dunedin during the season, and while he was good in A ball, (131 wRC+) he was even better in high A (153 wRC+). He did this with just average walk and power figures, being a 7.9 BB% and .146 ISO, which is not what you're looking for from a bat-first prospect. His .337 batting average was perhaps ballooned by a lucky .390 BABIP. On the contrary, the 2017 6th rounder has been described in the past as having plus raw power but difficulty getting it to play in games. In 2017 his GB rate was way too high at over 50%, but in 2018 he cut that number to around 35% at both levels and seemed to turn those worm burners into line drives. Hard line drives would explain most of that BABIP and make the figure somewhat reasonable for A+. Perhaps the next step is a bit more elevation on the batted ball profile and more baseballs leaving the park for this young man and his glorious fucking moustache.
Alberto Mineo + Ivan Castillo + Rodrigo Orozco
Mineo and Castillo were 2017 minor league Rule 5 picks by Toronto and they both had strong offensive years for Dunedin. Mineo walks a lot, had a .377 OBP this year, and if he can catch, he seems like maybe a backup C prospect, which is great for a MiLB Rule 5 guy.
Castillo has been described in the ancient past as an "above average runner, thrower and defender with enough feel to hit to be a prospect". He had never really hit in the minors until this year, where his 125 wRC+ was built largely on the basis of his .304 batting average which tied teammate Rodrigo Orozco for the best mark in the league. The rest of Castillo's offensive profile looked weak; whether or not he is a prospect of any stature would hinge on his ability to play SS. I believe Castillo became a minor league free agent at the end of the year and may have signed with San Diego.
Rodrigo has been on my fringe prospect radar for years because he has managed to get on base and produce during most of his lengthy time with the organization. He did it again this year with a .375 OBP and 124 wRC+, but I still don't see enough in the way of peripherals skills (power, speed, or defense) to consider him an MLB prospect in any way.
Riley Adams
Here is an actual dude. Adams was the Jays' 3rd round pick in 2017, with the big knock on his profile probably being that he might not be able to stick at catcher. Reports on the defense from this year were very positive. Catchers take so long to develop that they tend to slide off of organizational prospects lists in favour of newer, shinier names, and that seems to be what happened with Adams. You also need to take his numbers in context - that 110 wRC+ from this year doesn't jump off the page, but consider that this guy is probably working on his defense more than anything at this point. He also walked a good amount this year (12.2% of the time) and didn't strike out at an alarming clip.
At 6'4", 225 this is a guy with an absolute pro-body, and he has been given plus grades on his raw power and arm in the past (he threw out would-be base-stealers at a lofty 46% rate this year). Adams might have had the most impressive year of any Dunedin hitter. There are a number of names on MLB Pipeline's Blue Jays top 30 that really have no business being mentioned before Riley Adams.
Joshua Palacios
Quietly climbing the ladder, Palacios was productive in 2018 (124 wRC+) after being great in his 2016 debut and mediocre in 2017. He played most of his games in CF, which is important because there has previously been some question about whether that or a corner is his projected home. Palacios looks something like a 50 hit, 60 speed, CF prospect, which is a thing worth keeping tabs on. Also of note, his 8 HR this year was 6 more than he had totaled in his previous two minor league seasons combined. There is a big difference between having fringe-average power and being a slap-hitter, so that seems like a really positive development.
Cover image source: Joe Dinda on Flickr
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