2025 TCN Community Top 50 Prospect Voting

Does anyone else want to share their top 50? If I get about 5 or so responses at least, I can put together some analysis of the rankings like showing a range of where each player was ranked. It will make for a little more content to discuss potentially during these cold winter days.

It’s tough to decide what to do with Hjerpe at this point. Baez has made extreme upward movement. There’s still Davis as well. I also think Granillo and Gastellum deserve a callout even though they probably aren’t top 10. I’ve got:

1. Matthews
2. Wetherholt
3. Bernal
4. McGreevey
5. Saggese
6. Crooks
7. Roby
8. Hence
9. Raniel Rodriguez
10. Hjerpe

I decided to have a go at updating my prospect rankings, but with that a different methodology where I list ceiling and risk and use those to weight a prospects rankings. For inputs, I used previous scouting reports on players from Fangraphs, MLB, BA, and Blake’s here at TCN along with results obviously, statcast data where available, and comments I’ve read from prospect experts. I weighed these inputs and my own personal thoughts / evaluations of players to come up with my new top 50 for the month of June.

As a note, Future Value is defined as the median outcome of a player to give a more realistic eval into a single number of a player to ordinally rank the players. However, 2 key inputs are upside and risk. Upside I used the same 20-80 grade scouting scale and risk is low, medium, or high although obviously in each bucket there are variations like Royelny Strop is much higher risk than Josh Kross, although both are high in my book.

Here is how I break down each future value. Position players are taken straight from Fangraphs, while pitchers are my own adjustments as the pitching role has been changing and their breakdown isn’t accurate in my opinion.

+------+------------+-------------------------------+
| FV   | WAR/Year   | Position Player Role          |
+------+------------+-------------------------------+
| 80   | 7.0+       | MVP candidate                 |
| 70   | 5.0–6.9    | Superstar                     |
| 60   | 3.4–4.9    | All-Star                      |
| 55   | 2.5–3.3    | Above-average regular         |
| 50   | 1.6–2.4    | Average regular               |
| 45   | 0.8–1.5    | Low-end regular / Platoon     |
| 40   | 0.1–0.7    | Bench player                  |
| 35   | ~0.0       | Up/down, injury replacement   |
| 30   | <0.0       | AAAA / upper minors depth     |
| 20   | —          | Non-prospect                  |
+------+------------+-------------------------------+

+------+------------+-------------------------------------------+
| FV   | WAR/Year   | Starting Pitcher Role                     |
+------+------------+-------------------------------------------+
| 80   | 6.0+       | No. 1, true ace                           |
| 70   | 5.0–5.9    | No. 1 starter                             |
| 60   | 3.4–4.9    | No. 2 starter                             |
| 55   | 2.5–3.3    | No. 3 starter, elite closer potential     |
| 50   | 1.6–2.4    | No. 4 starter, good closer                |
| 45   | 0.8–1.5    | No. 5 starter, setup reliever, avg closer |
| 40   | 0.1–0.7    | Depth starter, middle relief              |
| 35   | ~0.0       | Up/down, injury replacement               |
| 30   | <0.0       | Org filler                                |
| 20   | —          | Non-prospect                              |
+------+------------+-------------------------------------------+

Here is some breakdowns from my rankings. Note I didn’t define it earlier, but Fangraphs uses SIRP as single inning relief pitcher and MIRP is multi inning relief pitcher.

Another note as well, but the + in 45, 40, and 35 tiers shows these players are a step above the rest in their category and closer to the next rank, but not quite there. Upside is quite often the differentiator here where a player can be better, but they need to improve some things and reduce risk to move up more.

+-------------------+-------+
| Player Type       | Count |
+-------------------+-------+
| Pitchers          | 30    |
| Position Players  | 20    |
+-------------------+-------+

+--------+-------+
| Pos    | Count |
+--------+-------+
| RHP    | 17    |
| SIRP   | 8     |
| COF    | 7     |
| CF     | 4     |
| LHP    | 4     |
| C      | 3     |
| SS     | 2     |
| 2B     | 2     |
| MIRP   | 1     |
| 3B     | 1     |
| 1B     | 1     |
+--------+-------+

+------+-------+
| FV   | Count |
+------+-------+
| 60   | 1     |
| 55   | 1     |
| 50   | 3     |
| 45+  | 5     |
| 45   | 15    |
| 40+  | 2     |
| 40   | 6     |
| 35+  | 10    |
| 35   | 7     |
+------+-------+

+---------+-------+
| Ceiling | Count |
+---------+-------+
| 60      | 3     |
| 55      | 3     |
| 50      | 4     |
| 45      | 23    |
| 40      | 17    |
+---------+-------+

+--------+-------+
| Risk   | Count |
+--------+-------+
| High   | 30    |
| Medium | 12    |
| Low    | 8     |
+--------+-------+

Thanks for the feedback Jnevel. I had to leave before getting to put some more comments on my list. When I put ceiling, to me it is more 80th percentile outcome. I really should have labeled this 80th percentile rather than ceiling. Most actual prospects if everything clicks and they improve in other areas (100th percentile outcome) could be an above average regular. 80th percentile to me represents what they can get to with the tools they have developing to their max (ie not changing approach drastically) and being a little more realistic of a “ceiling” rather than just raw ceiling.

Baez I struggled with and went between 50 and 45 for his 80th percentile outcome so I understand you point on him. I wasn’t sure on his power projection if he had traded raw power for contact ability (good trade to improve) so much that he wouldn’t have 20 HR upside. If I had statcast data on him it would be an easier choice, but I think looking at his power numbers this year and the fly ball rate he should likely have been a 50 and probably belongs in the 40+ tier with Lin and Hjerpe. I really appreciate the feedback though as I missed some things for sure and having discussions like this helps clear things up.

I also knew that many of the 35+ guys like Strop, Hunter, Franco, Dutkanyanch would likely be a point of debate. I realize they are much, much more risky (almost put extreme on them but decided to leave 3 risk levels), but they have much higher upside. There are so many guys in the org like Jeremy Rivas, Pete Hansen, etc that have such low upside that even in the best cases, they aren’t as valuable as more upside based prospects. If you win on 1 higher upside guy while missing 5 of them, it still works out as more value than the group of Hansen, Rivas, Antico, etc developing to their median outcome of an up down depth fill in option.

A part of my ranking was would I trade this guy (Strop) for this guy lower or higher than him (say Hansen) and if me as a fan would be upset at the GM for making a trade like that. GMs will all day take someone like Strop over Rivas all day. I also tried to think of if this guy were in the draft, where would he go (for IAFA guys) and someone like Strop would be a 3rd to 4th round pick (basing off money value and talent). Say someone Rivas is in the draft and I imagine he is more of a 8-10 round pick as more depth fill in rather than someone with a chance to be an impact player one day.

I did overlook Watson and just missed him in my eval. I didn’t look as close at RP, but pulling the data for him I would either have him at the top of the 35 FV range with a 40 80th percentile (meaning I think middle reliever). Watson must have some really good deception or ride on his fastball as it is only 90.0 MPH, but he gets 40% whiffs when people swing. The sinker and changeup also look good. His slider must be a work in progress as breaking balls you want 30+% whiffs on, but he only gets whiffs 13.8% of his sliders so it must be the pitch he is getting hit hard on. For context this is from his 2024-2025 time in Palm Beach as that is all I have statcast data on.

Ynfante I know BA has in their top 30, but I wasn’t impressed by his stats nor his statcast data. His slider is likely his best pitch as he does have a good 37% whiff rate with it, but I think Ynfante really needs some extra velo as his 4 seamer and sinker don’t miss a lot of bats and upping the velo from 91-92 range to 95ish would likely help him reduce contact quality. I think he could certainly be a guy to keep an eye on though if he can gain some weight and put on velo.

Jnevel, thanks for taking the time to update your list. I understand the difference on DSL guys and understand a weight difference of the unknown versus known.

I think your ranking of Deniel Ortiz is where many will have him or even higher, but I’ll go out and say I think he is going to make that ranking look quite low as he develops. The underlying data on this guy is great and he is someone who hits the ball hard and hits the ball hard consistently when he makes contact (high hard hit rates).

I know I am going to be the low man on this forum for Graceffo as I had him all the way down at 36, but what do others see in him as an upside? I see a low leverage long reliever without much higher ceiling. Physically maybe he could be better, but I don’t know if he has the mentality required to reach something like a #5 SP upside or back of the end bullpen.

Would you trade Graceffo for Yairo Padilla? I would quite confidently state all 30 teams in baseball if the were offered that trade, they would choose Padilla every day due to his upside being much higher.

Albert – You hit the upside on Ortiz. The downside is that he’s worse than Prieto on defense. He’s likely to be 1B or DH only. That’s what saps his value for me. But the bat is exciting for sure. We will see how it holds up against better pitching. I’m a bit skeptical there.

As for Graceffo, at present, I think he’s about equal value as Padilla hence my ranking. Padilla has a LONG way to go. Huge potential upside. But far more likely that he fizzles out along the way. It’s not like he’s setting the world on fire in the FCL (current OPS of .724). I see Graceffo as the other internal candidate for future closer alongside Granillo. One likely ends up as a high leverage setup guy. I don’t really see him starting again. If that’s truly the case, then to me the values are close. Either we get a mostly sure thing high leverage reliever or a likely to fail, but possible future all star shortstop who likely makes an early move to 3B because of size.

jnevel, I agree that Graceffo and Granillo could be potential closers someday. I am fairly high on Svanson too although I realize I am in the minority on that one. He may never be a closer but he could be a younger Phil Maton which has some value. You never know about these young relievers. Leahy went from the outhouse to the penthouse this year.