Unique Players
There were 44 players who only appeared on one list. Fangraphs led the way with 13 such players, including Colin Moran, who was #53 on their list but didn’t make the top-100 on any other. Moran was a well-regarded prospect prior to the 2014 season but has fallen off the other lists. He hasn’t shown much power overall in his five minor league seasons, but is coming off a .308/.373/.543 showing in 79 games in Triple-A. His scouting summary at Fangraphs mentioned “substantive changes to his swing in 2017, which unlocked dormant raw power without compromising his natural feel to hit.”
Keith Law had 12 players who didn’t appear on any other list. James Kaprielian (#56) was their highest ranked player among this group of 12. He was a top-100 guy on multiple lists prior to last season but didn’t pitch at all in 2017 because of an elbow injury that led to Tommy John surgery. Law believes he still has number one starter potential.
Baseball Prospectus has 10 unique names on their list. Outfielder Magneuris Sierra (#56) is their top-ranked unique name. He was signed by the Cardinals out of the Dominican Republic in 2012. In 442 minor league games, he’s hit .292/.339/.378. He also got into 22 games with the Cardinals last year and got on base well enough, but showed very little power (.317/.359/.317). He was part of the Marcell Ozuna trade in December, so he’s now with the Miami Marlins organization.
Call to the Pen had just four unique players. Tanner Scott (#91), Brusdar Graterol (#92), Austin Beck (#93), and Luis Ortiz (#95) were the four guys in the Call to the Pen top-100 who didn’t appear on any other list. Scott is a left-handed pitcher on the Orioles who has struck out an impressive 251 batters in 198.7 minor league innings. Unfortunately, he’s also walked 145. He pitched 1.7 major league innings last year and continued this pattern, walking two and striking out two.
The vast majority of the MLB.com list had players who appeared on at least one other list, but there were still three who did not. Those three were Christian Arroyo, Kevin Maitan, and Mickey Moniak. Arroyo has been on the MLB.com top-100 in each of the last three years. He was also on the Baseball America list prior to the 2016 season. He’s been a good gap-to-gap hitter in the minor leagues, but has yet to tap into much power. The Giants traded him to the Rays in the offseason as part of the Evan Longoria deal.
The list with the fewest unique players is Baseball America, which was also the list with the highest average correlation to the other lists. Only two of their top 100 did not appear on any other list—Brent Rooker (#92) and Wander S. Franco (#96). Rooker is an outfielder in the Twins organization who was drafted in the first round last June (35th pick overall). He hit .281/.364/.566 in 62 games in his first professional season.
Franco was signed by the Rays out of the Dominican Republic last June. At the time, he was considered the top international prospect. He just turned 17 on March 1 and has yet to play in the states. He’s the nephew of Erick Aybar and has two brothers in the minor leagues. This ranking is based predominantly on projecting his raw talent.