NEW TAIPEI CITY, TAIWAN – NOVEMBER 15: Jen-Ho Tseng /
With the minor league baseball season starting, who are some prospects not on top lists who people should be paying attention to?
The minor league baseball season kicked off on Thursday, and many have followed the top players and where they will start the year. However, there are plenty of players who deserve attention outside of the top 100 lists, so we are going to look at 10 players outside of top 100 lists who you should be tracking this season!
We’ll look at all 10 in alphabetical order:
Austin Allen, C, San Diego Padres
A Division II college catcher from Florida Tech, many thought that Allen’s bat would allow him to get selected but that his size (6’2″, almost 250 pounds at times in his draft season) would make him a first base candidate. Instead, Allen has really put the effort into trimming up his body and sits around 215-225.
Allen has seen his catching take a step forward over the last two seasons, and his fringe-plus arm gives him a chance to stick behind the plate. What caught the eye of evaluators in 2017 was a swing change Allen was working on throughout the season.
While some may dismiss his season due to it coming in the Cal League, Allen showed his swing changes to be significant throughout the year. In the first half of 2017, he hit .250/.338/.427 with 8 home runs, a 10.5% walk rate, and a 22.9% strikeout rate. In the second half, he hit .316/.368/.567 with 14 home runs, a 6.4% walk rate, and a 19.2% strikeout rate.
Allen could be making a push for one of the better catching prospects in the game by the end of the season.
FORT MYERS, FL- MARCH 12: Andrew Bechtold /
Andrew Bechtold, 3B, Minnesota Twins
Chipola College won the 2017 Junior College National Championship, and Bechtold was a big reason why. Bechtold struggled to get playing time at Maryland his first two seasons, but when he got to Chipola, he exploded for a .419/.532/.676 line in the middle of the Chipola lineup.
Bechtold hit well in his pro debut in the Appy League, showing his good eye at the plate, hitting .299/.406/.424 with 10 doubles and 2 home runs, posting a 15.4% walk rate and a 22.9% strikeout rate.
While his game approach still is more gap power than home run power, showing excellent contact skills, Bechtold has put up incredible power displays in the batting cage and has plus raw power that he could tap into. Defensively, Bechtold could work at short in a pinch, and he should profile as a top-end defensive third baseman, with his plus arm being one of his absolute strengths as a player.
He will start 2018 in Cedar Rapids in full season ball for his first full professional season. He very well could end up moving up to high-A Fort Myers by the end of the 2018 season, putting him on the fast track to seeing the major leagues by the end of 2019.
Next: A Brave and a Ray
Jasseel De La Cruz, RHP, Atlanta Braves
This spring, one of the better Braves prospect follows on Twitter (and a guy definitely worth your follow, even if you’re not a Braves fan!) was discussing a recent De La Cruz performance in camp, and we had this exchange:
Excited to see how he handles 2018. Wonder if he’s Rome-bound.
Well, he was Rome-bound, and he made his first start of the season on Friday, and it was a beauty. Facing a Hagerstown lineup that is one of the better ones in the South Atlantic league, De La Cruz went 5 innings, and he did not allow a single hit, walked just one, and struck out 8 Suns hitters.
In a Braves system that has one of the deepest pitching rosters in all of minor league baseball, a guy like De La Cruz can get lost, but he features a plus fastball and slider that flashes plus. He showed significant improvement in his change and his overall control last year, with his curve remaining a “show me” pitch, but still one that if sequenced well, could work for him as a fourth pitch.
Built long and lean at 6’1″ with very long arms and legs for his height, De La Cruz has added 10-15 pounds seemingly every season in the Braves organization, looking a solid 175-180 now on the hill. The Braves moved him to the first base side of the pitching rubber in 2016 during his time in the GCL, and it’s helped him significantly in his line to the plate, though he can fall into the trap of trying too hard to overpitch situations, and he’s added a bit of a toe hitch at the top of his delivery that seems to have helped calm his timing to the plate this season and could lead to big things. Of course, in this organization, he’s going to have to push beyond a lot of top 100 type of arms to make his name known, but more work like he did on Friday will get him going for sure.
Joe McCarthy, 1B/OF, Tampa Bay Rays
McCarthy was a highly-touted player coming out of Virginia, but he had back surgery his draft season, causing him to fall to the 5th round, where the Rays were more than happy to grab him, and they’ve been willing to push him aggressively through the system, pushing through both A-ball levels in his first full season in 2016 and having a nice year with the Rays’ AA club in 2017.
McCarthy is one of those guys in minor league baseball that you don’t notice during a game all the time, but you look up at the end of a few games, and he’s gone 3/10 on the series while drawing a few walks and making some quality plays on the bases due to his surprising athleticism at 6’3″ and 225-230 pounds. His arm is really the thing that limits him to a LF/1B profile, otherwise, he has quality instincts in the outfield that would allow him to handle right field well and even cover center in an absolute pinch.
At the plate, McCarthy is a very disciplined hitter, with good feel for the strike zone and the ability to put barrel to the ball frequently, but he has a bit too flat of a swing at this point. He was showing off a bit of swing change that allowed for more loft in his swing during the spring, and if he could keep up his fringe-plus contact rate while tapping into above-average or better power over the fence, he could be a very good offensive piece.
Next: A Phillie and a Ranger
McKenzie Mills, LHP, Philadelphia Phillies
In the lower levels of their system, there are not many teams who have more Latin American pitching talent in minor league baseball than the Phillies. That makes it easy to understand why a guy who was originally an 18th round pick out of high school in the Washington Nationals organization didn’t exactly register high in rankings after being picked up in a mid-season trade last summer.
However, Mills is a guy who was struggling early in his pro career, but he’s turned things around after a mound adjustment and some physical maturity really allowed him to grow into his 6’4″ frame more. Working with a 4-pitch mix that are all above-average pitches, albeit none a consistent plus pitch, Mills’ sequencing of his repertoire will be key to his success.
With a now-filled-out 205-215 pounds on his 6’4″ frame, Mills has the size and pitch mix to be a be a very reliable mid-rotation starter from the left side, and if he can reach that ceiling, along with Nick Pivetta, the Phillies will have nabbed two solid starting pitchers for a half-season of Jonathan Papelbon and a month of Howie Kendrick!
Yanio Perez, 1B/3B/OF, Texas Rangers
Signed from Cuba in September of 2016, Perez had a very good first season in the Rangers organization, but definitely seemed worn down in the second half before once again showing more life in his bat and his feet in the Arizona Fall League. Questions about his conditioning when he arrived in 2017 could have led to the issues in 2017, but he arrived in camp in 2018 looking much more lean and much more cut.
In Cuba, Perez was able to handle first, second, third, and corner outfield spots. While he won’t win a Gold Glove at any of those spots, he is certainly capable at each, with an above-average arm that likely would play best in an outfield spot or third base.
At the plate, Perez put on flashes of the raw plus power that he showed in Cuba during his first pro season, hitting 23 doubles, 3 triples, and 14 home runs over 123 games in 2017. He is a smart base runner, but only average foot speed, so he won’t be a guy to likely steal 20 bases, but he could grab 10 a year when the defense and pitcher aren’t paying attention to him.
Already at AA in his second season in the Rangers organization, if his better conditioned body can show an ability to be a quality third baseman, Perez could find himself in the seat as Adrian Beltre’s potential successor in Texas.
Next: A Red and an Astro
Alfredo Rodriguez, SS, Cincinnati Reds
The Reds have had strong ties to Cuba for some time now, and Rodriguez was one signee that has been both incredibly raw and incredibly polished at the same time, and that is exactly why he is one to track because if that raw starts to polish, he could jump immediately to the majors as an impact player.
With the glove, Rodriguez very well may be the best defensive shortstop in all of minor league baseball. He has tremendous range that looks absolutely effortless in his movements and showing very sure hands. His arm is plus, and he has cleaned up some issues with erratic throws that plagued his pre-signing reports.
In the box, Rodriguez is still incredibly raw, with quick wrists and plus speed that he too often attempts to utilize in a slash-and-dash style when he’s physically built much better to take advantage of the gaps offensively, and possibly even tap into some average raw power. The biggest issue will be zone recognition as Rodriguez seems to pick up pitches, but he struggles in his zone awareness, often swinging out of zone at pitches.
The Reds have opened Rodriguez at AA Pensacola, and some work he did in the cage this spring has really seemed to pay off, as he’s hitting the ball with more authority, going 4-7 with a pair of very sharp singles right at outfielders. He’s also already drawn his first walk of the season as well, which is a good sign.
Myles Straw, OF, Houston Astros
Like Rodriguez, Straw is a guy whose offensive profile is going to work best by getting the ball into gaps and using his double-plus speed to wreak havoc on the bases that way. Unlike Rodriguez, Straw has already shown impressive bat to ball skills along with an incredible eye at the plate, and he’s already shown that this year, with 4 walks in his first two games.
Defensively, Straw is incredibly impressive in center field tracking down balls, initially relying on his pure speed to help grab balls from the air, but over the last two seasons, he has really developed his reads off of the bat. He’s got an above-average arm that works in center field as well.
If Straw can more consistently utilize his bat skills to get the ball into gaps, especially to his pull side, he could be an ideal leadoff hitter with excellent on base skills, tremendous speed, and the ability to impact the ball enough to keep pitchers honest as well across minor league baseball as well as MLB eventually.
Next: A Cub and a Rockie
Jen-Ho Tseng, RHP, Chicago Cubs
A number of elite prospects got their seasons started over the last few days in minor league baseball. After viewing roughly a dozen games Thursday and Friday, none had a more impressive pitch than Tseng’s curve in his start against Oklahoma City.
Signed by the Cubs out of Taiwan in 2013 in the same signing class that brought the team Gleyber Torres and Eloy Jimenez, Tseng is not the typical minor league baseball pitcher in the modern era in that of his four (or more) pitches, his fastball probably grades the lowest of them, with a low-90s velocity and minimal movement, but good location on the pitch.
Tseng has fringe-plus to plus grades on his curve, cutter, and change, and he works with plus command and fringe-plus control of his pitches. When he is at his best and sequencing his pitches well, Tseng has the look of a very good back end starter. On Thursday, Tseng added not just his typical tight-spin curve, but a couple of curves with depth, and he got very weak contact on them when he used them. Working with multiple grips on his plus off-speed stuff will allow good location on his fastball to play up even further, and he could be a fill-in starter for the Cubs this year.
A rare high school second baseman who was projected as a first rounder, Wall saw possible top 15 draft prospects fall to the 35th overall selection by the Rockies when he tore the labrum in his throwing shoulder. He’s never quite gotten the arm strength back that he once had, which has been a liability at times in the infield, prompting a move to the outfield in 2017. His transition appeared to be going well in the outfield until Wall dislocated his non-throwing shoulder diving for a ball in May and missed the rest of the 2017 season.
Wall has excellent contact skills, tough he’s not shown the raw speed that he once flashed in high school, when some scouts were willing to put 70 and 75 grades on his raw speed. He’s still certainly a plus runner, but his polish as a base stealer is still not there, and he has been noted for making sloppy base running mistakes at times.
Wall is a frequent name scouts bring up as a guy with plenty of raw ability that could absolutely explode if he ever got it all together around injuries that have plagued his minor league baseball career thus far. He is opening 2017 in high-A Lancaster, which should certainly pad his numbers, but he will be on pace to move quickly to the upper levels of the minors by mid-season if he’s able to show he can hit well and handle the outfield.
While I could add dozens more, these are just 10 players for you to keep an eye on during the 2018 minor league baseball season. Every game, however, can show a player you weren’t expecting to impress you!
