Top 10s Revisited: AL West
With clubs set to infuse more talent into their systems next week, and now being two months into the minor league season, it’s a great time to take a quick look at how the Top 10 prospects are doing in each system. Today, we’ll take a look at the American League West. So far we’ve looked at the AL East, the NL East, the AL Central, and the NL Central.
*The Top 10 lists originally appeared in FanGraphs’ Second Opinion fantasy guide published in March.
Carter and Taylor have been mild disappointments in triple-A so far this season. Cardenas’ bat has completely disappeared and he’s got an OPS of .595 in triple-A right now. Weeks, though, has picked things up and has looked good. He’s doing a little bit of everything right now in double-A. His future double-play partner, Green, is also performing well one level down. The shortstop, though, has 56 strikeouts in 54 games despite modest power potential. Stassi has shown some pop in his bat with seven homers, but he too is struggling with the Ks: 62 in 47 games.
Trout continues to tear apart low-A ball and has a BABIP-fueled .371 batting average. He’s also nabbed 30 bases in 34 tries; he’s even showing some patience at the plate. For interest’s sake, fellow ’09 draft pick Grichuk (who’s not on the Top 10 list) has had a rougher go in low-A ball and he’s currently on the disabled list. Their teammate Martinez has 79 strikeouts in 54.1 innings pitched, but he’s also walked 41 batters. Similarly, and one level up, Chatwood has 58 strikeouts and an outstanding ground-ball rate but he’s walked 32 batters in 60.1 innings. Conger has hit pretty well in triple-A, although his power numbers are down and he’s batting just .175 as a right-handed hitter.
Feliz has asserted himself as one of the top closers in the American League despite his youth. You could look at this as a negative, if you’re like me and think he should be getting stretched out in triple-A right about now with an eye on becoming a starter. Smoak has had less success in Majors but the club appears committed to him at first base. The bottom half of the Top 10 list is treading water right now, with the exception of Ross. The young lefty is showing a respectable strikeout rate along with a very good ground-ball rate; he has yet to give up a homer this season in 64.1 innings of work. It’s not outside the realm of possibility that Scheppers could see some MLB action in 2010.
After a very slow start, Ackley is back. The infielder rebounded from a terrible April when he hit just .147. He bumped his average up to .303 in May and is hitting .444 in his last 10 games with 13 walks and just two strikeouts. The overall Top 10 list has been pretty uninspiring to this point, outside of Franklin and Pineda. The shortstop is enjoying his first taste of full-season ball with an unexpected power outburst (12 homers) and a .959 OPS in low-A ball. Pineda is giving up more fly balls than usual but he also has 63 strikeouts in 57.1 innings of work. He’s allowed more than two runs in a start just once this season in 10 games.
1
What a lazy series. If you’re just going to do a quick scan of each player’s stats thus far, at least post the stats so the readers can get a better idea of what you’re talking about.
As for the A’s: Taylor has been a lot more than mildly disappointing, and Weeks hasn’t been doing a little bit of anything in AA because he’s been on the DL (again) for the past month.
I think Max Stassi deserves an “up” arrow. His .757 OPS and 8 homers (crude, I know) in the Midwest League as a teenage catcher is pretty impressive.
Marc, I share your point of view on Feliz (making him a starter) but I think we have become the small minority. What things make you believe he’d be better as a starter?
The fact that he’s too talented to be a reliever.
Feliz should be groomed as a starter. Yes, he does help the team tremendously in his current role, but long term he is much more valuable as a starter. Some would argue that the Rangers current (apparent) plan with Feliz and Scheppers is flip flopped. Tanner is being groomed as a starter, though they have him pitching short stints in relief currently to monitor his innings. I think Tanner could be a very good starter in the bigs, but the injury risk is high that it doesn’t outweigh the potential longevity of a shutdown closer.
Back to Feliz, his secondary pitches don’t support “ace” starter, but he’s 22 years old. There’s no reason he can’t develop those pitches to be at least above average if given the chance. Of course, the Rangers could very well move Neffy to the rotation next year (or even the year after), but they seem content to having him pitch 70-80 innings a year instead of 200.