Just a reminder. Combining Low-A and High-A last year, then-19-year-old Masyn Winn — away from the extremely pitcher-friendly environs of Roger Dean Stadium and Dozer Park — batted a stellar .320 in 185 trips to the plate.
And furthermore, if we take those road numbers from 2021 and extrapolate to 160 games, Masyn would’ve hit 16 homers, 8 triples, and 44 doubles to go with that .320 average. And he’d have posted 52 steals in 56 tries.
Based on his performance in Low-A last year as a teen, Masyn Winn probably should’ve been a consensus top 100 prospect. Across all four levels of full-season minor league ball last year, there were very few players who met these five qualifications: young for league, up-the-middle defender, 110 wRC+ or better, .60 BB/K or better, and 7.0 speed score or higher. Masyn Winn and Robert Hassell III were in fact the only two minor leaguers to satisfy all five requirements. (Both did so in Low-A at 19, before struggling upon their High-A promotions.) But I think everyone got too distracted by (1)the rather fanciful two-way possibility for Winn; and (2)his terrible performance in High-A last year.
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Shohei Ohtani notwithstanding, the two-way thing was highly unlikely to ever reach fruition for Masyn. If he winds up a pitcher, so be it. But hitters stay healthier by a long shot, and are just generally more valuable over time. So that has naturally become the focus for Winn. Good for the Cards to not get drunk on his velocity and rush & ruin him, as they’ve done so despicably with Jordan Hicks and Johan Oviedo.
And as to the other matter, anyone who merely makes it to High-A as a teenager has already accomplished something. A positive performance there is just gravy. And a poor performance by any player when they are multiple years young for their league should simply be ignored, assuming the player succeeded one level lower during the same season.
Based on his total pro track record, estimating his 80th-90th percentile outcome, Masyn Winn could be Tim Anderson with more walks. He could be Jimmy Rollins without all the popups. Or maybe he’s just a future Tommy Edman, but at shortstop rather than keystone. And that’d be dandy too.