Scouting Book's Top 750 prospects for 2015

[jimmer]

Buxton at #5, Sano at #13.

 

Four Cubs in the top 12.

 

http://www.scoutingbook.com/prospects/

[nater79a]

Anybody figure out how to filter this by team instead of scrolling through?

 

I did notice Jason Adam at #242 (trending up).  This is my shocked face  .

[jimmer]

In the top 50, we have Buxton at #5, Sano at #13, Gordon at #39, Berrios at #40, Meyer at #44 and Stewart at #48.  So six of the top 50.  After that we're looking at #96, Rosario, as our next one.

[Seth Stohs]

In the top 50, we have Buxton at #5, Sano at #13, Gordon at #39, Berrios at #40, Meyer at #44 and Stewart at #48.  So six of the top 50.  After that we're looking at #96, Rosario, as our next one.

 

I like this ranking! I figure there'd be 6 in the top 50 or close to it!

[maxisagod]

Ha. Kennys Vargas listed at 166. Not really Eligible anymore.  

[Seth Stohs]

Stephen Pryor listed at 147. Kennys Vargas listed at 166. Both of these guys are no longer "rookies" and haven't been on my list. They're still here though.

 

Also, JR Graham at 144 still listed with the Braves. 

[Jeremy Nygaard]

I have a hard time with rankings that don't follow the universal rules for what makes a prospect a prospect.

[Seth Stohs]

This list is crazy.... other than the Top 100...

 

Byron Buxton 5

Miguel Sano 13

Nick Gordon 39

JO Berrios 40

Alex Meyer 44

Kohl Stewart 48

Eddie Rosario 96

Nick Burdi 139

JR Graham 144

Stephen Pryor 147

Kennys Vargas 166

Trevor May 199

Jason Adam at 242

Lewis Thorpe - 252

Jorge Polanco - 284

Joe Benson - 323

Mason Melotakis - 390

Danny Santana - 401

Luke Bard 423

Brandon Poulson 508

Yohan Pino 520

Adam Walker 521

Max Kepler 529

Travis Harrison 541

Levi Michael 564

JT Chargois 599

Stuart Turner 601

Zach Jones 631

Ryan Eades 648

Niko Goodrum 680

Stephen Gonsalves 715

Aaron Slegers 727

Michael Tonkin 749

 

I know I might be a little higher than most on Taylor Rogers, but he should be in the top 300. Yohan Pino ahead of Walker and Kepler. Joe Benson hasn't been with the Twins in forever. Danny Santana at 401?!

[h2oface]

Could someone direct me to the definitive universal rules for what makes a prospect a prospect?

[nater79a]

Joe Benson...hmmm.

[jimmer]

Could someone direct me to the definitive universal rules for what makes a prospect a prospect?

I've seen prospect listing use different rules.  Some won't touch anyone who has had any time in the majors, some won't touch anyone who has exceeded rookie status, some consider young players with less than a year still a prospect.  Lots of different ways I've seen.

[James]

Joe Benson...hmmm.

I was just going to mention that.  I'm assuming that this is the same Joe Benson that the Twins lost to Texas, played in the Miami system last year and according to his Wikipedia page signed a deal with the Atlanta Braves on January 10th, 2015.

 

Hmmm, indeed.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Benson

[jimmer]

I rarely care about a prospect listing past the top 100, so while there certainly are some weird rankings for the Twins (and likely other teams) WAY past 100, I don't think it takes away from the overall view of the main prospects.

 

But I mean, one can certainly discard it as hocom. Most of them end up being hocom anyway.

[ExpectMorePayLess]

If you don't count Vargas and Santana and Benson and add Graham on this list, you have 30 of the 750 prospects from this publication.  I think this list is crazy as well, in terms of who and where they have prospects listed.  It's obvious they don't truly try to evaluate beyond the top 100.   We have 4% of the prospects on this list.  Not sure if that is good or bad considering the number of teams in the league? 

Evaluating per 100.  

7% of the Top 100  

5% of the Top 200

4% of the Top 300

3% of the Top 400

3% of the Top 500

4% of the Top 600

4% of the Top 700

4% of the Top 750

SCOUTINGBOOK.COM

They make this hard to respect.  You can tell they have not put in the work to anayze their list.  Players on the wrong team.  Players who are not eligible for rookie of the year honors because they already played enough games at the MLB level in 2014.  Makes you appreciate Jeremy, Seth and the boys that much more for their in depth research.

[James]

If you don't count Vargas and Santana and Benson and add Graham on this list, you have 30 of the 750 prospects from this publication.  I think this list is crazy as well, in terms of who and where they have prospects listed.  It's obvious they don't truly try to evaluate beyond the top 100.   We have 4% of the prospects on this list.  Not sure if that is good or bad considering the number of teams in the league? 

Evaluating per 100.  

7% of the Top 100  

5% of the Top 200

4% of the Top 300

3% of the Top 400

3% of the Top 500

4% of the Top 600

4% of the Top 700

4% of the Top 750

SCOUTINGBOOK.COM

They make this hard to respect.  You can tell they have not put in the work to anayze their list.  Players on the wrong team.  Players who are not eligible for rookie of the year honors because they already played enough games at the MLB level in 2014.  Makes you appreciate Jeremy, Seth and the boys that much more for their in depth research.

I agree that a list this big makes it clear that they don't do their homework for every prospect on the list.  They also have Yohan Pino listed for the Twins at 520.  If you look at the description they have for him, it just says "undefined".  

 

You're right about another thing; this makes a person realize how great TD is as a resource.   

[nicksaviking]

Can't wait for the team to transition Sano back to SS also.  Looks like this list is made using the cut and paste tool.  I applaud the initiative in rating this many players, but clearly, it overwhelmed them.

[diehardtwinsfan]

Could someone direct me to the definitive universal rules for what makes a prospect a prospect?

 

There are no universal rules.  Everyone has a different opinion, that's what makes ranking fun.

[jimmer]

There are no universal rules.  Everyone has a different opinion, that's what makes ranking fun.

they are certainly supposed to be fun.

[diehardtwinsfan]

This list is crazy.... other than the Top 100...

 

Byron Buxton 5

Miguel Sano 13

Nick Gordon 39

JO Berrios 40

Alex Meyer 44

Kohl Stewart 48

Eddie Rosario 96

Nick Burdi 139

JR Graham 144

Stephen Pryor 147

Kennys Vargas 166

Trevor May 199

Jason Adam at 242

Lewis Thorpe - 252

Jorge Polanco - 284

Joe Benson - 323

Mason Melotakis - 390

Danny Santana - 401

Luke Bard 423

Brandon Poulson 508

Yohan Pino 520

Adam Walker 521

Max Kepler 529

Travis Harrison 541

Levi Michael 564

JT Chargois 599

Stuart Turner 601

Zach Jones 631

Ryan Eades 648

Niko Goodrum 680

Stephen Gonsalves 715

Aaron Slegers 727

Michael Tonkin 749

 

I know I might be a little higher than most on Taylor Rogers, but he should be in the top 300. Yohan Pino ahead of Walker and Kepler. Joe Benson hasn't been with the Twins in forever. Danny Santana at 401?!

 

There's quite a bit of issues with their ordering in  my opinion.  Polanco, Thorpe, May, Santana, and Walker are all way too low given the upside and/or major league production.  Garver isn't listed all and is certainly a better prospect than most of the guys on the bottom.  He's got Burdi pretty high, but Zach Jones is near the bottom and they have similar profiles.  Tyler Jones and Reed aren't even on the list, and they are also quite similar.  I'm not a fan of high ranking relievers, but all four of these guys look to be back of the pen shut down options. 

[Shane Wahl]

Joe Benson...hmmm.

I swear I did not make this list . . .

[Shane Wahl]

I saw this site several days ago and got excited. And then . . .

[Thrylos]

They have a (not so small) disclaimer here  Excerpt:

 

ScoutingBook.com is the backyard toolshed of a handful of swell fellas (and one sassy lady) who live, work or breathe baseball, online gaming, or both. We use Scouting Book as our own touchstone to collect and share our opinions, rankings, and ideas about baseball prospecting in a connected world. We're also sharing these opinions and rankings here for those who may be interested.

We're not ESPN, with a billion dollar budget, hairdressers and a shiny, shiny studio. We're not even John Sickels (though at least one of us would like to have his baby.) We're just a group of baseball-minded folks who needed a place to pool our resources and record our thoughts on prospects while we experiment with some online collaboration ideas. The site has grown a little from there.

 

The Scouting Book website is a series of generated reports from a whole mess of online and offline systems. Scouting Book's prospect 'rankings', our biggest feature, are actually a Combined Ranking: a calculated summary of player valuations based on inputs from across the entire baseball-prospecting world. Our depth charts of current and future closers (our 'Closer Watch' feature) is produced in a similar way.

 

Important: We do not 'choose' where (or whether) to 'place' prospects in the ranked list. Prospects appear where the formula places them each time the calculation is run (usually nightly). A prospect who is highly-ranked on other significant lists (BA, ESPN, etc) will automatically appear in a calculated position on our site, assuming we have their core data in our offline database of 2,000+ prospects.

 

We don't reject old-school scouting reports, and we don't discount modern sabermetric statistics, either: we bow out of that entire argument and use our system to try to deliver values that come from both the head and the gut at the same time.

 

Pretty cool stuff, but you have to take it in context, and the context is up there...

[jimmer]

Thrylos, yes, I probably should have pointed that out earlier.  Should have learned that lesson when talking about ZIPS projections and people being so leery of the projections because of projected plate appearances for certain players even though the disclaimer clearly says they aren't actually saying they'll have that many PA. :-)

[Seth Stohs]

Yeah, it's fun to read all the various lists, and then people can determine if it gives them any value.

 

 

As for who I include in "Prospect" lists... I go by whether or not he has retained his rookie status in MLB. MIchael Tonkin, Stephen Pryor, kennys vargas and danny santana are no longer rookies starting in 2015, so they would not be included in my rankings.

 

I believe Thrylos removes guys as soon as they hit the big leagues, maybe?

Baseball America goes by the

[h2oface]

There are no universal rules.  Everyone has a different opinion, that's what makes ranking fun.

 

Exactly. That was my veiled point. There are no universal rules that I know of.

[nicksaviking]

 

ScoutingBook.com is the backyard toolshed of a handful of swell fellas (and one sassy lady) who live, work or breathe baseball, online gaming, or both.

 

That explains the Stephen Pryor ranking.  I heard he's a level 30 warlock equiped with both an invisibility spell and multi-attack ability.

[Brock Beauchamp]

Could someone direct me to the definitive universal rules for what makes a prospect a prospect?

While there are some rather arbitrary lines drawn by some, it's pretty much accepted that if a player has lost rookie status and is on the MLB roster, he is no longer a prospect... He's an MLB player at that point.

 

Weird list is weird.

[2wins87]

It's an interesting list, some of the inputs to their rankings are clearly outdated (Joe Benson), but then they have Poulson at 508, so they must have some sort of report about his fastball.  I'm not really sure what to make of it, maybe they catch some info about prospects that others don't, maybe it's completely meaningless.

[Otto von Ballpark]

I think there are some problems with it, probably due to its full automation.  Taijuan Walker at #6 has 53 MLB IP already.  Baez at #10 had 229 MLB PA last year.

 

Which is a shame, because the concept sounds good to me (prospect rank/grade aggregator).

[Otto von Ballpark]

From their site:

 

 

We consider any MLB rookie-eligible player a 'prospect' no matter how old, and players are graduated the year after they no longer qualify as MLB Rookies, though their biographical information page remains available for historical interest.

 

Doesn't sound like this has been fully updated for 2015 then, contrary to what it says on the list.  (In addition to the problem of tracking and removing past prospects who never reached rookie status, like Benson.)

 

It would be interesting to see how many total prospects are even rank-able.