COMING SOON TO A BALLPARK NEAR YOU
Published Wednesday, March 5, 2008
by David Luciani

The past two years, we published an essay around this time entitled "A Different Type of Prospect List" which some readers out there incorrectly took to be some sort of official top fifty prospect list. In no way was it ever intended to be that and many names who would appear near or even at the top of a regular prospect list were left off those two lists. So, we've given this annual piece a new name but the focus of it remains the same.

The goal was to flag prospects whose short-term future seemed bright and/or immediate, regardless of how they project over a full career. So, older players can easily crack such a set because we're only thinking about three years out rather than considering the sum of a player's eventual long-term accomplishments.

We use a mathematical system to create these lists and there is little room for opinion really, other than to break a tie and/or remove a player for whom we have clear-cut extra information that the system wouldn't catch which would be a reason why the player shouldn't be included. So, the names are almost entirely arrived at using a tool we've developed in recent years which considers our minor league translations along with a number of other factors such as what level a player was playing at recently, how old he is, what position he plays and how his path seems to be in terms of the chances of him making a big league appearance in the near future.

The 2008 value of all players listed is already covered in our regular projection set and while it plays a small part in whether a player will make this list, it is not critical. The system targets potential big league value up until and including about the next three years of performance - I used to say 2-3 years but hindsight has allowed me to conclude that it's closer to three years than two and I feel somewhat comfortable with saying it refers to that range of time. What a player does beyond year three, even if he's going to continue being good, is in no way relevant to whether a player makes it on to this list.

I haven't in the past and don't plan to start including commentary as this is a statistically-produced list for which I do not wish to openly reverse-engineer why a player has been listed. Suffice it to say, if he's here, the system says that his 2008-2010 value is high compared to other prospects, regardless of what he'll do beyond 2010.

Before I get to this year's list, I want to look back at the first two such lists we published. The first of these was published prior to the 2006 season in the first week of March and was a hitters only list. At the time, we had not yet developed a similar method for pitchers and so we included the names of just fifty hitters. Given the expected range for which the list has value, there's still one year left (i.e. this upcoming season) for players to live up to the expectations we had for them then.

Regardless, let's look back at the first list and follow up to see how many players who were listed have ended up being at least somewhat valuable since then, just to give the reader a sense of the possible success rate for the system. Both the 2006 and 2007 lists were published during spring training, though spring training performance and/or whether a player wins or loses a role as Opening Day approaches has absolutely no effect on whether a player will appear:

The Pre-2006 List

Of the fifty names included, about 23 have had some big league impact since. Those names are (in the order they happened to appear on the list) Delmon Young, Howie Kendrick, Ben Zobrist, Nick Markakis, Prince Fielder, Ian Kinsler, Kevin Kouzmanoff, Conor Jackson, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, Adam Lind, Lastings Milledge, Michael Bourn, Kelly Johnson, Nate McLouth, Josh Wilson, Matt Kemp, Jeremy Hermida, Matt Diaz, Hunter Pence, Ryan Shealy, Michael Aubrey, Melky Cabrera and Corey Hart. In addition to those, there were 5 players who could still make an impact in 2008 but who haven't really been much of a factor in the first two years since. Those names are Andy LaRoche, Joey Votto, Daric Barton and Delwyn Young.

The Pre-2007 List

This list was the first for which we attempted to expand the system to include pitchers. It's harder to rate this list as only one year has passed since it was published but we can still flag the players who have so far been interesting, some of whom had also appeared on the pre-2006 list and were re-listed because of a failure to break through in 2006. Names included on the pre-2007 list were Delmon Young, Andy LaRoche, Alexi Casilla, Phil Hughes, Dustin Pedroia, Yovani Gallardo, Eric Aybar, Chris Young (ARI), Adam Lind, Alberto Callaspo, Hunter Pence, Kevin Kouzmanoff, Matt Garza, Billy Butler, Miguel Montero, Carlos Quentin, Kevin Slowey, Joey Votto, Michael Bourn, Elijah Dukes, Reggie Willits, Ryan Braun (MIL), Carlos Ruiz and Lastings Milledge.

Though the group which has already arrived is admittedly hitter-heavy (I've highlighted only four pitchers as having an impact here so far), it's important to note that just eight pitchers were even listed out of the fifty players, something we'll be changing this year. Jay Bruce, who was our top-ranked prospect in our old-style "true" prospect lists published back in January of 2007, did not make this list as it focused only on short-term value. So, you should be able to see the distinction between what this system does and what the system we use for ranking prospects over a full career does. The latter method is the one we now use to highlight prospects for our new "Five for the Future" section which often appears in our free newsletter and which has replaced our old-style official prospect lists.

Without further ado then, let's get to this year's list. Once more, this list is entirely systematic and is not a ranked prospect list in the traditional sense. We're simply sharing with you the pre-2008 results of applying the same system that produced the past couple of lists and telling you that these players, under that system, project to have an interesting impact in the majors within the next three years. One thing we have done this year is to separate hitters from pitchers, offering the names of 30 hitters and 20 pitchers. Positions listed are those that the player appeared at in 20 or more games in the minors in 2007. A player does not have to have rookie status to appear on this list (e.g. Alberto Callaspo and Justin Upton are both listed, among others) but generally, we try to remove a player who has had substantial playing time in the majors already. That the top six pitchers are all in the American League is entirely coincidental so please don't read anything into that other than this is the way the list came out statistically. Finally, we have endeavored to update all the teams to reflect player movement since the end of 2007 as well. Enjoy!

Hitters
1. Brent Lillibridge, SS, ATL
2. Joey Votto, 1B, CIN
3. Jay Bruce, OF, CIN
4. Reid Brignac, SS, TB
5. Alberto Callaspo, SS/2B KC
6. Alexi Casilla, 2B/SS, MIN
7. Jacoby Ellsbury, OF, BOS
8. Steven Pearce, 1B, PIT
9. Chris Nelson, SS, COL
10. Ben Francisco, OF, CLE
11. Colby Rasmus, OF, STL
12. Chase Headley, 3B, SD
13. Justin Upton, OF, ARI
14. Hainley Statia, SS, LAA
15. Eric Young Jr., 2B, COL
16. Chin-Lung Hu, SS, LAD
17. Eugenio Velez, OF/2B, SF
18. Eric Patterson, 2B/OF, CHC
19. Ryan Raburn, OF, DET
20. Cameron Maybin, OF, FLO
21. Adam Jones, OF, BAL
22. Max Ramirez, C, TEX
23. Jordan Brown, 1B, CLE
24. Brett Gardner, OF, NYY
25. Sean Rodriguez, SS, LAA
26. Felix Pie, OF, CHC
27. Evan Longoria, 3B, TB
28. Erik Lis, OF, MIN
29. Jed Lowrie, SS, BOS
30. Andy LaRoche, 3B, LAD

Pitchers
1. Clay Buchholz, BOS
2. Jack Egbert, CHW
3. Joba Chamberlain, NYY
4. Ian Kennedy, NYY
5. Gio Gonzalez, OAK
6. Jacob McGee, TB
7. J.A. Happ, PHI
8. Garrett Olson, BAL
9. Will Inman, SD
10. Matt Maloney, CIN
11. Scott Lewis, CLE
12. Wade Leblanc, SD
13. Jerry Blevins, OAK
14. Wade Davis, TB
15. Max Scherzer, ARI
16. Johnny Cueto, CIN
17. Clayton Kershaw, LAD
18. Christopher Cody, MIL
19. Jo-Jo Reyes, ATL
20. Pat Misch, SF