Baseball America released an updated top 100 prospects list on Monday. They have four Pittsburgh Pirates on the list, down from six in their June 2nd update, though one of those players was Roansy Contreras, who is no longer eligible for the top 100 lists due to exceeding both the maximum innings and days of service time allowed.
BA’s list starts off with Oneil Cruz moving from 21st to 11th, with two of those spots being players who graduated ahead of him. The Pirates prospect charts are going to take another major hit soon in addition to Contreras graduating. Cruz already has 84 at-bats in the majors. Between playing every day and not walking, he’s going to surpass that 130 at-bat maximum quickly, shortly after the All-Star break ends you would assume.
Second on the list is Henry Davis, who dropped from 34th last time to 44th now. Davis has barely played since their last updated list was put together and he struggled a bit, which with him being on the injured list again due to his wrist, might be connected. You have to wonder if that drop-off in production was injury related. It appears to have factored into his drop.
Liover Peguero was 69th overall before and he’s 68th overall now. Technically, this is a small drop because players ahead of him graduated, even though he moved up one spot.
Quinn Priester is in the final spot for the Pirates. He goes from 81st in June to 74th now. He actually moved up one spot when you figure in players graduating since the last update.
Besides Contreras, the list is missing Nick Gonzales, who has been out since May 31st due to a heel injury and isn’t likely to return any time soon (he’s not eligible to return until August). He was ranked 68th in the last BA update.
This list from BA is quite different from the one just released by MLB Pipeline, which included Gonzales, as well as the other four players, all in their top 50.
John started working at Pirates Prospects in 2009, but his connection to the Pittsburgh Pirates started exactly 100 years earlier when Dots Miller debuted for the 1909 World Series champions. John was born in Kearny, NJ, two blocks from the house where Dots Miller grew up. From that hometown hero connection came a love of Pirates history, as well as the sport of baseball.
When he didn't make it as a lefty pitcher with an 80+ MPH fastball and a slider that needed work, John turned to covering the game, eventually focusing in on the prospects side, where his interest was pushed by the big league team being below .500 for so long. John has covered the minors in some form since the 2002 season, and leads the draft and international coverage on Pirates Prospects. He writes daily on Pittsburgh Baseball History, when he's not covering the entire system daily throughout the entire year on Pirates Prospects.
I am a big Nick Gonzales fan, I think he has a lot of great intangibles, and some very good tools to work with.
However, I am now getting off that 🚂. In the last year he’s had vision correction, and I don’t believe he’s picking up slider spin. That’s a deal breaker for me, you got to be able to distinguish sliders now and then if you’re main value comes from the bat.
I’m not predicting he’s a lost cause, I do however believe the hill Nick’s climbing is getting steeper as he goes…
Hopefully after the draft we will have 1 maybe 2 more in the top 100. Time to draft for quality not quantity.
Noone other than the top 10ish picks will be in the top 100, so would have to come from a promotion in the organiztion
I am not surprised that Nicky the K was left off of the Top 100, which is kinda sad.
The only takeaway from this list is proof the Pirates need more high ceiling prospects. Last year’s draft produced a few of them. Hopefully this year BC follows suit and avoids drafting Lee, Collier, or any other “high floor” MI type players.
This deep into Bennie’s ‘rebuild’ we only have Roansy that BC gifted us with.
Contreras graduated and cruz likely will soon too, not so surprised that gonzales fell off. I do wonder, though, who might be poised to jump on these lists other than #4 pick. Was kinda expecting it to be burrows, but maybe solo or bubba makes an entry soon if they keep seeing success
I was a little surprised that Keith Law said that Burrows was nothing more than a backend starter, I thought he was more highly regarded than that.
The good thing is Keith Law’s opinion won’t factor in the success, or lack thereof, of Burrows. But unfortunately, I don’t think his stuff is exceptional. I do like his makeup though. I have confidence he will have some success because of his will to win.
I think about it this way…
Joe Musgrove is a low-#2, high-#3 and Mike Burrows’ stuff doesn’t sniff Joe’s.
Is it that crazy to call Burrows a 4/5? Baseball’s really hard!
I just like seeing ‘experts’ rate our guys highly as they have a much better pulse on their projection and talent across the minors as a whole than I do. None of the rankings actually mean anything but boy doesnt it feel good when all the big name writers agree that our farm system is loaded?
Will ANYBODY’s opinion factor in? The point is that KLaw is a well respected scouting expert.