Navigation: Jump to content areas:


Pro Quality. Fan Perspective.
Login-facebook
Around SBN: Win or Lose, Boston Celtics' New Big 3 Era A Success

Thoughts On TCB's Top 30 And A Reader Prospect List

So, I have a few wrap-up type thoughts on our Top 30 podcasts and the list we came up with. Let's move to the bullet points: 

 

  • Adam Bailey deserves to be a C prospect and probably deserves to be listed above Dan Adamson. But, Bailey is only interesting because he hit 16 home runs in Lexington as a 23-year old. You're not going to find many players like that on prospect lists. Bailey did have some success at Corpus Christi, but also featured an unsustainable BABiP and an absolutely terrible walk rate. I still think Adamson has value because he can play center field and has good power, though he had a terrible 2011 season. Bailey is limited by his defense and needs to keep hitting to provide value. Still, he could end up with the upside of a Jacob Goebbert pretty easily with another good season.
  • Another pair of prospects that I'm torn on is Dallas Keuchel and Ross Seaton. They showed similar numbers this season, but the difference is that Seaton is a year and a half younger and Keuchel has a slightly better strikeout rate in the past. Both are showing signs they might actually make it to the majors, but it's not looking like either will make a big impact.
  • Another pair I wonder about is the third base duo of Jonathan Meyer and MIke Kvasnicka. I didn't love the Kvas pick when the Astros made it and he hasn't shown nearly enough to prove he's got the bat to stick at third. Of course, it's not like Meyer has either. Of the two, Meyer has the age and walk rate edge, but Kvas has really only his draft position. However, Kvas also has the ability to play different positions and can still move back to catcher. It's a thin line and isn't enough to separate them materially, as both are still probably C-level prospects.
  • Jordan Scott is going to pop up on some lists, though his numbers weren't entirely compelling. He's not Chase Davidson in that respect, but he is more athletic. He's also got some speed and stolen base ability, but he got ranked No. 14 on Baseball Prospectus' list because of his bat. Like a lot of the prospects above him, he'll get ranked higher because of his potential, not his production.
  • If we're talking about players who are closest to the majors, you have to look at Brett Oberholtzer, Paul Clemens and Goebbert. Of those, Clemens probably has the chance to make the most impact, possibly putting up a season like Bud Norris in 2009.
  • For those who were asking, I think J.D. Martinez, Jose Altuve and Jimmy Paredes still slot behind the top three on our list. 

After the jump, I've set up a Google form you can use to rank your own Top 30 prospects. Just enter the names and grades you want in the form below and we'll compile all your answers into one list. Let's give it a week and then I'll publish those results along with our list.

Star-divide

 

Comment 58 comments  |  0 recs  | 

Do you like this story?

More from The Crawfish Boxes

Tuesday's Three Astros Things

May 2012 by David Coleman - 10 comments

Astros Minor League Recap

Sep 2011 by Subber10 - 8 comments

Comments

Display:

As for Kvasnicka and Meyer, the TCB ranking for Kvasnicka is lower than Goldstein’s ranking at B-Pro. Goldstein had him in the Astros Top 20, while he was the next 20 – 30 for TCB. I doubt that the TCB list overrates Kvas relative to Meyer. Or at least, it’s a defensible ranking.

And, David, that is a nifty way to allow readers to input their rankings into Google docs. I didn’t know it could be set up that way.

by clack on Nov 4, 2011 11:59 AM CDT reply actions  

I honestly don’t know enough about the prospects past the first 15 or so to fill out the whole form.

Any way to shorten it?

by CRPerry13 on Nov 4, 2011 1:53 PM CDT reply actions  

Sure

I’ll just make the Top 10 required. That way, you can stop ranking at whatever point after that you feel comfortable with.

I’m a simple man. I like pretty, dark-haired women and breakfast foods.
--Ron F'ing Swanson

by David Coleman on Nov 4, 2011 1:56 PM CDT up reply actions  

Gracias

I didn’t want to skew results, and I have a feeling there are more people like me than people who can talk 30-deep about Astros prospects with any real knowledge.

by CRPerry13 on Nov 4, 2011 3:18 PM CDT up reply actions  

What do the numbers mean exactly?

10, 9, 8, 7, and 6 all apply to top 100 prospects? That seems a bit extreme. Maybe if A-/A (top 15 or so) = 10, B+ (top 40 or 50) = 9, B (top 100 or 120) = 8, then keep “3” as your “average prospect” and 2 for a borderline prospect, and 1 as a non-prospect like you have it. Then we’d have 4, 5, 6, and 7 to play with among normal significant prospects instead of just 4 and 5, where basically the #4 prospect in our system and the #20 (or so) prospect in our system won’t be judged in that tiny window.

I only mean to be helpful, as I can see how it could lead to some really ambiguous rankings.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 4, 2011 2:30 PM CDT reply actions  

9 – A
8 – A-
7 – B+
6 – B
5 – B-
4 – C+
3 – C
2 – C-
1 – non-prospect

Keep in mind:
9 or A is a Top 5 prospect in all of baseball
8 or A- is a Top 25 prospect in all of baseball
7 or B+ is a Top 50 prospect in all of baseball
6 or B is a Top 100 prospect in all of baseball

Follow my ramblings on Twitter .

by Timothy De Block on Nov 4, 2011 2:39 PM CDT up reply actions  

It’s the system Sickels uses and the same one we used. If we want to compare the reader list to our list and even John Sickels list everyone has to use the same system.

Follow my ramblings on Twitter .

by Timothy De Block on Nov 4, 2011 2:44 PM CDT up reply actions  

Oh you misunderstood or I didn't explain myself well enough

If you want a ranking, and we have 11 B- types roughly speaking, you aren’t going to get a good one since it is almost impossible to consider the #4 to roughly #15 players in our system anything but a “5” according to this ranking. Maybe a couple you could rank a “4” if you consider them C+ but then they just get confused with the rest of the C+ types.

But additionally, there is no C- in John’s system and there would be no “non-prospects” in any top 30 of any team (no C- types either), and no A+ ( or 10 grade) either.

I mean, the grading alone doesn’t help the ranking at all in just about any system. Remember, in John’s system, the #45 guy and the #120 guy might both be straight Bs. He does give half grades sort of, where he says “borderline such and such” and in a mass grading system, we’d def need those borderline grading distinctions (as some of you in the podcast say you used).

Basically, in a top 30, you only need A to C grades, and you can realistically combine A-/A/(A+) together for all practical purposes, as there are only about 15 total each year. That allows for 4 more grading distinctions, maybe B/B+, B-/B, C+/B-, and C/C+ which would help a ranking a ton and lead to a more accurate overall grade, even if you rounded up everything at the end to straight C+, B-, B etc grades.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 4, 2011 3:01 PM CDT up reply actions  

I'd also like to say

Thanks for putting this reader vote together. It is definitely a fun idea.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 4, 2011 3:03 PM CDT up reply actions  

I think you’re making it more complicated that it is. Maybe I’m missing something but you should be giving each prospect their own grade. So if you want to give Jonathan Singelton a 4 or C+ grade you type in his name and select the number 4 dot indicating you think he’s a C+ prospect.

Once we have everyone’s grade we’ll input them into a ranking board and average out the grades and then rank them by that average.

As far as the half grades go in the current format that would cause more confusion than anything we would gain in accuracy. For this year it’s best to just decide which full grade you lean more towards. In the future when we do these we’ll refine the format a bit more and incorporate that aspect better.

Follow my ramblings on Twitter .

by Timothy De Block on Nov 4, 2011 3:14 PM CDT up reply actions  

I was only trying to be helpful

Put it this way. People that are going to be strict graders are going to give everyone from #4-#30 in the system a 5, 4, or 3 grade, because no one other than the top 3 are reasonable top 100 candidates and no one is a C-. This is actually the case for almost any prospect list, with slight variations. So the only differences in grading are going to come from players at the edges between 4 and 5 grades and 3 and 4 grades. I guess that doesn’t help much in my opinion to give a good overall impression of how we would rank the prospects as a community. Again, I’m not suggesting you change it since it’s already up there, but I’m assuming people will give out grades to the #4-#30 guys other than just 5,4,3, which in my opinion is totally fine, but doesn’t reflect anything resembling a Sickels type grade, because in the end it will help with the accuracy of the rankings.

No big deal, just putting in my 2 cents.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 4, 2011 4:02 PM CDT up reply actions  

I’m pretty sure I got what you were getting at and it’ll certainly be taken into account next time for a more accurate grade. I still think we can get a pretty good idea of what the community thinks of these prospects using full grades.

Follow my ramblings on Twitter .

by Timothy De Block on Nov 4, 2011 5:09 PM CDT up reply actions  

For what it is worth

All of my grades for the top 30 were between 7 (B+) and 3 ©.

by pacbellpilgrim on Nov 5, 2011 11:56 AM CDT up reply actions  

26 out of 30

Which is OK with me, as long as others similarly grade in a way that corresponds to Sickel’s scale, and as long as there is some type of system to deal with the “no votes,” as you and clack are discussing.

by pacbellpilgrim on Nov 5, 2011 12:22 PM CDT up reply actions  

Via Matt Eddy at Baseball America. Astros minor league free agents.
Houston Astros (16)
RHP: Erick Abreu (AA), Sammy Gervacio (AAA), Brad James (AA), Ross Wolf (AAA)
LHP: Kristian Bueno (SS), Ryan Rowland-Smith (AAA), Andy Van Hekken (AAA)
C: J.R. Towles (AAA)
1B: Koby Clemens (AAA)
2B: Jose Vallejo (AAA)
3B: Jhonny Medrano (Lo A), Oswaldo Navarro (AAA)
SS: Anderson Hernandez (AAA), Wladimir Sutil (AA)
OF: Luis Durango (AAA), Drew Locke (AAA)

by MadMartygan on Nov 4, 2011 2:50 PM CDT reply actions  

The only one that would be a bummer to lose would be Gervacio.

by Snake Diggity on Nov 4, 2011 2:55 PM CDT up reply actions  

Yeah. I wouldn't mind them resigning him.

Maybe Sutil or Hernandez would be decent to sign. I’d like Villar to get a year at AA. Maybe Wikoff can handle AAA shortstop.

by MadMartygan on Nov 4, 2011 2:58 PM CDT up reply actions  

I had a brain-fart and couldnt think of much, so I went with my top 12.

Anyways I think Domingo Santana should be up a little higher than some of the list I looked at.

If i were Arnold Rothstein id pay Ryan Braun all the money he
wants to stop going on homer streaks against the poor Astros....

am i the only one?

by ccislanders on Nov 4, 2011 3:37 PM CDT reply actions  

I think so too, on potential, but his strikeout rate concerns me. A lot.

by CRPerry13 on Nov 4, 2011 3:55 PM CDT up reply actions  

K rate

Does really bother me. He’s still among the lowest of the B- types for me. He did have a nice small sample stretch after being traded, but I’m ALMOST ignoring the improved K rate. It is probably the most scary thing an otherwise talented prospect can be failing to do. Power can come later, walks can come later, but Ks are a bad sign, and don’t just mean he’ll strikeout a lot in the majors if he makes it. K’s are a very different thing for minor leaguers than major leaguers. Like K:BB ratio matters for major leaguers. It means almost nothing for low level minor leaguers. Walks and Ks are tied together at the low levels like they are at the upper levels and majors.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 4, 2011 4:06 PM CDT up reply actions  

I still like his potential

But I keep hearing his power potential is a bit overblown, and he might be a 30-35 HR perfect world ceiling type.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 4, 2011 4:07 PM CDT up reply actions  

K Rate Amoung Astros minor leaguers in general

I think our development system’s is severely flawed and has been for years. Why is it that our trainers and coaches seem to not care a lick about walks and taking pitches. I also think 2 strike hitting is very crucial, meaning when you get two strikes you shorten your swing and punch the ball somewhere, not take your normal full hack. Also with 2 strike hitting you protect the plate, if the pitch is close slap at it, foul in play is better than a strikeout. It just kills me to continually see this philosophy of never changing your swing just in case you happen to make contact with two strikes it might go farther. All through college and high school, some of my best hits were using a quick punch swing, you tend to focus more on the pitches I have found. Some of the most frustrating hitters I faced when I pitched were the slap hitters because they would always foul off the best pitches and wear me down with high counts. I would rather have a lineup full of these type hitters that had less power than a lineup of “mashers” who K every third at bat.

by blazemule on Nov 4, 2011 4:21 PM CDT up reply actions  

Well that might be a good idea

But it is a little different from what I was saying. High K rates in the low minors means a player probably can’t currently EVER hit a good pitch, only mistakes and crappy pitches from pitchers who don’t have good stuff. In the majors almost all hitters are able to hit some good pitches, because no pitcher makes it to the majors without fairly decent stuff. High K rates in the majors is what you seem to be talking about (or developing players so that their eventual K rate won’t be so high when they reach the majors). But most high K major league hitters today weren’t super high K hitters in the low minors. No one could get anything by them. With Santana, lot of mediocre pitchers are striking him out regularly. And it is a concern if he doesn’t fix it fast.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 4, 2011 4:34 PM CDT up reply actions  

K rate for Nash is even scarier

Santana’s is not ideal, but 135 in 418 AB’s doesn’t seem excessive for a guy who just turned 19.

by pacbellpilgrim on Nov 5, 2011 7:51 AM CDT up reply actions  

Well, they are both about equally bad

Santana did put up a decent K rate in a very small sample in Lexington, but his K history is almost historically bad. I mean, their numbers suggest there isn’t that big a gap between the two players. But I do have Santana as a low B- and Nash as a medium C+ because of the year and a half age difference.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 5, 2011 9:58 AM CDT up reply actions  

And Nash is 2 years older

So yes, that would concern me too. And also probably why Santana appears so much higher on most prospect lists.

by CRPerry13 on Nov 5, 2011 1:39 PM CDT up reply actions  

Only one noteworthy pro list has come out

And the two players were ranked 6th and 7th. Maybe you are referring to last years lists? I’m not sure.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 5, 2011 3:40 PM CDT up reply actions  

I’m referring to national top 100 lists, not Astros-only prospect lists.

by CRPerry13 on Nov 5, 2011 5:25 PM CDT up reply actions  

Top 100 type lists, I mean. Having issues with clarity today. So national prospect ranking. Neither are top 100. I need a nap.

by CRPerry13 on Nov 5, 2011 5:25 PM CDT up reply actions  

On the surface you’re right. But the lineup as constructed was worth 35.5 WAR, or $157.8 million dollars this past year.

by AronV on Nov 4, 2011 4:29 PM CDT up reply actions  

I imagine you could make very similar lists with most of the teams, if not all the teams, in the league.

Follow my ramblings on Twitter .

by Timothy De Block on Nov 4, 2011 5:11 PM CDT up reply actions  

Joe Savery made your list of Top Prospects?

…seriously?

The bird is struggling out of the egg. The egg is the world. Whoever wants to be born, must first destroy a world.

by Stupendous Man on Nov 4, 2011 5:57 PM CDT via mobile up reply actions  

He was a prospect…. It was a name I recognized

by AronV on Nov 4, 2011 8:43 PM CDT up reply actions  

You're entitled to your opinion...

…but Savery is no longer a top 100 prospect. I’m not even sure he would crack the Phillies top 30 list this year.

The bird is struggling out of the egg. The egg is the world. Whoever wants to be born, must first destroy a world.

by Stupendous Man on Nov 5, 2011 3:57 PM CDT via mobile up reply actions  

That's a contender

but i thought Astros traded Brad Lidge for Michael Bourn

Astros fan for life

by Joe in Birmingham on Nov 4, 2011 6:41 PM CDT up reply actions  

Astros actually drafted bourn, but didn’t sign him….

by AronV on Nov 4, 2011 8:42 PM CDT up reply actions  

Yeah, I did something similar about a month ago

Found here: http://www.crawfishboxes.com/2011/9/26/2450945/what-if-draft-day-alternate-reality

I don’t know if it’s depressing. More like it shows what a crap shoot the draft really is.

by CRPerry13 on Nov 5, 2011 1:40 PM CDT up reply actions  

very nice work, I might add.

by AronV on Nov 7, 2011 10:43 AM CST up reply actions  

Difficult to rate the guys in the lowest leagues

In some ways, DSL guys Juan Santana and Teoscar Hernandez are more interesting prospects to me than some of the higher level guys. In the end, though, I left them off of the list because there are just too many unknowns with them. They will be fun to watch develop nonetheless.

by pacbellpilgrim on Nov 5, 2011 9:01 AM CDT reply actions  

Question

Are you going to give all the unnamed prospects a default “1” grade? Because I’m sure some people have the 30th listed guy as a “2” and you’d need some way to distinguish between the 30th guy and an unnamed guy. You don’t want a player that 5 people listed and gave a 3 or 4 to, to end up being ranked higher than a player that 20 people listed and had a lower overall score.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 5, 2011 9:53 AM CDT reply actions  

That's a good point

I think that there should be some lower default grade given to those who do not make someone’s list.

by pacbellpilgrim on Nov 5, 2011 10:01 AM CDT up reply actions  

Even though a "1" grade

Might skew the whole thing down a bit if someone only lists 10 players lets say, I still think it doesn’t skew it down all that much. If someone stops listing at 10 or 12 or 15 or whatever, it is probably at a point where that voter thinks there is a drop-off in talent anyway. And the 1 grade would reflect that – It would probably counterbalance some overly high grades given out to lower players anyway, and create a sharper distinction between perceived tiers of players as well.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 5, 2011 10:23 AM CDT up reply actions  

I think you would need to make that rule explicit before people vote. When I voted on the TCB list, I knew that an omitted player would have no affect, positive or negative, on the average. If a “default” grade would have resulted, I would have changed my decision to omit a player and placed a grade. For players I viewed as non-prospects (like Koby Clemens), I issued grades of “1.”

by clack on Nov 5, 2011 12:09 PM CDT up reply actions  

Yeah but...

In this poll, if someone omits Jay Austin, that means he is outside the top 30, and worse than the 30th ranked person. If one person puts Jay Austin on as a 5 grade and everyone else omits him, what is his overall score? 5?? It should be the average of 5 and a ton of 1s.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 5, 2011 12:11 PM CDT up reply actions  

I understand

That you did it differently in the podcast poll, but this is kind of different because we are only ranking 30 guys max and we don’t have the opportunity to give Koby Clemens or Jay Austin a “1” grade, it is sort of just assumed they’d get a 1 or maybe a 2 by leaving them off the top 30.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 5, 2011 12:15 PM CDT up reply actions  

I see what you are saying. I think it becomes problematic when people are permitted to different numbers of rankings. Perhaps David or Timmy, or whomever will tabulate this, should check to see if the problem exists, and then come up with a solution if necessary.

by clack on Nov 5, 2011 12:20 PM CDT up reply actions  

But if someone only ranks 10 players, that doesn’t mean that they would rank Austin as a 1 if they had ranked more players. The person might have ranked more players if they knew that would be the result. I see the problem you’re raising. And with a public ranking like this, there is always the possibility of a low number of votes skewing the result. If it appears to be a problem, my suggestion would be to require a minimum number of votes for any player to be ranked, so that there will always be some averaging effect.

by clack on Nov 5, 2011 12:17 PM CDT up reply actions  

Well

Minimum votes is better than nothing. Still I left some people off my list that I would give a “1” or “2” to that I know others would give a better grade to. My ranking of those players gets lost. I think if we used the “1” default grade, it causes the least problems, and probably actually counteracts homerism to some extent. Realistically, no one is going to leave off a prospect they really like, so if someone stops after 13 votes, it is probably because that voter sees it as the end of a tier of significant prospects. If those players get "1"s it will make that tier clear in the overall rankings, and won’t cause a major skewing down problem, since most default 1s will actually correspond to 1s and sometimes 2s anyway.

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 5, 2011 5:14 PM CDT up reply actions  

You’re making a lot of assumptions about the data before we’ve even gotten a chance to go through it. I think we’ve got a lot of intelligent people commenting on and contributing to this site. I would suggest curbing your “homerism” accusation until we’ve actual had an opportunity to look at the data.

Follow my ramblings on Twitter .

by Timothy De Block on Nov 5, 2011 9:49 PM CDT up reply actions  

Accusation?

I think you’re making too much of it. I am not saying it is a bad thing. I think that “1” grades are likely going to be fairly representative of non-listed players, but to the SMALL extent that those assumed and unintended “1” grades might lower one or two C+ types to C types, I think there is an equal likelihood that a couple players might be given C+ that are likely considered no where near a C+ by any site (take Kyle Hallock for example – we can debate whether his ranking in the podcast poll was homerism or just super-insight, but it is far from his nationally viewed status – he didn’t make my top 30, and I would give him a “2” probably, but a “1” is certainly more representative of my non-vote for Hallock than if my non-vote was simply considered a vote to confirm what the people who like Hallock think about him).

by auclairkeithbc on Nov 6, 2011 9:11 AM CST up reply actions  

Singleton

Here is a prospect ranking with Singleton at 65. Frankly, I hadn’t heard of this web site, but I saw it linked on the Astrosdaily news feed. I get a pessimistic feeling (“Singleton has a Daric Barton vibe”) from this discussion.

by clack on Nov 5, 2011 12:53 PM CDT reply actions  

BA had Singleton ranked in the 30’s going into the 2011 season. This web site shows a 2011 ranking for Singleton at No. 51, so the #65 means that his ranked dropped in the view of this rater. However, I have to wonder about the rankings, since Jordan Lyles was the 3d best prospect in the major leagues, according to the 2011 ranking. The 2011 ranking also has Andrew Brackman at No. 50, and that prospect is now available to any team, since the Yankees DFA’d him last week.

by clack on Nov 5, 2011 2:02 PM CDT reply actions  

I’ve been to that blog in the past. I don’t want to go so far as to call it disreputable, but the guy(s) who makes those annual lists has wildly different rankings than the majority of other publications like BA and Baseball Prospectus.

The bird is struggling out of the egg. The egg is the world. Whoever wants to be born, must first destroy a world.

by Stupendous Man on Nov 5, 2011 3:55 PM CDT via mobile up reply actions  

Comments For This Post Are Closed


User Tools

Welcome to the Crawfishboxes, the SBNation blog for the Houston Astros.

FanPosts

Community blog posts and discussion.

Recommended FanPosts

Chimp_small
The Importance of George Springer

Recent FanPosts

Small
Oswalt in 2012
Small
Heck and Co. - Your time is up.
Small
Santana and a bold new top 10, etc..
Astros_retro_logo1_small
Lance Berkman with possible torn ACL...
Astros_retro_logo1_small
Quasi update on Lucas Giolito for draft
100_1519_small
Good News
Small
Thinking about where the top 2012 draftees will be ranked for 2013
Astros_small
Most valuable building blocks
Nsapcs13_large_small
Minor League Open Thread

+ New FanPost All FanPosts >

TCB Tweets!

    

Current Series

Astros lead the series 1-0

Fri 05/25 WP: Lucas Harrell (4 - 3)
SV: Brett Myers
LP: Clayton Kershaw (4 - 2)
3 - 1 win

Houston Astros
@ Los Angeles Dodgers

Saturday, May 26, 2012, 9:10 PM CDT
Dodger Stadium

Bud Norris vs Chad Billingsley

Mostly clear. Winds blowing out to right field at 5-15 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 65.

Complete Coverage >

Sun 05/27 3:10 PM CDT

NL Central Standings

W L PCT GB STRK
Cincinnati 25 20 .555 0 Lost 1
St. Louis 25 21 .543 0.5 Lost 2
Houston 22 23 .488 3 Won 4
Pittsburgh 21 24 .466 4 Won 1
Milwaukee 19 26 .422 6 Won 2
Chicago 15 30 .333 10 Lost 10

(updated 5.26.2012 at 6:14 PM CDT)

Yahoo_full_count

Managing Editors

Tcb_icon_small Timothy De Block

Old_school_dome_logo_small David Coleman

Editors

Nsapcs13_large_small clack

H_astros_small Subber10

Astrobritrs2_small AstroB

Small conroestro

Small CRPerry13