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A Different Type of Hitting Prospect List
published March 9, 2006
by David Luciani
As most readers know, I publish a free annual top prospect list
every year, usually in December, that often causes surprise and even some severe
criticism among readers who would rather that I give them more what that they
expect to see than what I really think. One of the difficulties any writer
faces when publishing prospect lists is that they know that it will fall under
review within a year or two at most even though most of us who publish such
lists are trying to forecast ten or even twenty years down the road, as if we
were looking back on a player's career and judging it in its entirety.
Occasionally, I get emails from readers who say that they wish I
would publish a prospect list that really only focused on the next few years,
largely because they're looking to fill their fantasy reserve rosters with
players who will help them within the next few seasons and not ten years from
now. They also don't care if a prospect comes up and helps them but then
disappears back into obscurity a few years after that, perhaps because of some
weakness in their game that takes a while to show. In that respect, I
suppose a list such as that would also "look better" a year or two
after it is published, at least to the casual fan who doesn't want to wait ten
years to review the quality of a prospect list. In other words, a list
such as that pays dividends much more quickly and is much better suited to folks
like the fantasy leaguers who want names for their reserve list that won't take
long to help them.
In that spirit, I want to give you a different type of prospect
list, an additional one beyond that which I already published back in
December. This list uses the exact same long-term forecasting methods I
use to build my ordinary lists but it cuts off consideration of a player's
future to review how a player did by the end of 2008 only. That is, I'm
sorting players here only by how I think they'll do in the majors within the
next few years and I completely ignore what happens after the end of 2008.
I haven't decided yet if I'll be able to create a similar list
for pitchers because performance in the pitching group is much more dynamic and
especially over a three year period instead of a twenty year period, I'm not yet
confident that such a list for pitchers would be a worthwhile one or would offer
quality that's to my satisfaction.
In any case, here is how I would have ranked the top hitting
prospects (players with fewer than 130 major league at bats who also meet our
typical minimum criteria of having appeared for a significant period of at least
a Single-A season or higher) if I only showed interest in which prospects would
help me by the end of 2008. In other words, for those readers who insist
on measuring the quality of my prospect lists only a year or two after they are
published, then I suggest you use this list to rate how well (or poorly) I
project the future of prospects, if you simply can't wait until at least 2009 or
2010 to do a retroactive analysis of my official lists. I strongly suspect that a year or two from
now, this list will "look" much better, in hindsight, than my official
top prospect list, which endeavors to project a career and not just a few
seasons. Usually, I'm not trying to please the group of readers who don't
want to wait a substantial amount of time before grading the quality of a
prospect list but I suspect that a list such as this would get a much higher
grade from those readers in two or three years, even if it doesn't look as good
twenty years from now. In other words, I think Howie Kendrick will have a
much stronger 2006-2008 combined than many other prospects I normally rank ahead
of him for the period 2006-2030, or at least that's what the model says.
Even focusing on a few years, there are still a few surprises near the top,
according to the model, like Bejamin Zobrist (who was injured at the end of
2005) and Kevin Kouzmanoff at #9, among many others.
1. Brandon Wood, SS, LAA
2. Delmon Young, OF, TB
3. Howie Kendrick, 2B, LAA
4. Benjamin Zobrist, SS, HOU
5. Nick Markakis, OF, BAL
6. Prince Fielder, 1B, MIL
7. Brandon Moss, OF, BOS
8. Ian Kinsler, 2B, TEX
9. Kevin Kouzmanoff, 3B, CLE
10. Javier Herrera, OF, OAK
11. Andy LaRoche, 3B, LAD
12. Ian Stewart, 3B, COL
13. Conor Jackson, 1B, ARI
14. Jarrod Saltamacchia, C, ATL
15. Joel Guzman, OF, LAD
16. Wes Bankston, 1B, TB
17. Andy Marte, 3B, CLE
18. Danny Sandoval, SS, PHI
19. Adam Lind, OF, TOR
20. Joey Votto, 1B, CIN
21. Lastings Milledge, OF, NYM
22. Michael Bourn, OF, PHI
23. Kelly Johnson, OF, ATL
24. Nate McLouth, OF, PIT
25. Josh Wilson, SS, COL
26. Matt Kemp, OF, LAD
27. Ching-Lung Hu, SS, LAD
28. Kory Casto, 3B, WAS
29. Jeremy Hermida, OF, FLO
30. Matt Diaz, OF, ATL
31. Shin-Soo Choo, OF, SEA
32. William Bergolla, 2B, CIN
33. Joseph Koshansky, 1B, COL
34. Brad Eldred, 1B, PIT
35. Hunter Pence, OF, HOU
36. Brian Horwitz, OF, SF
37. Ryan Shealy, 1B, COL
38. Daric Barton, 1B, OAK
39. Adam Stern, OF, BOS
40. Adam Heether, 3B, MIL
41. Michael Aubrey, 1B, CLE
42. Melky Cabrera, OF, NYY
43. Carlos Gonzalez, OF, ARI
44. Delwyn Young, 2B, LAD
45. Drew Anderson, OF, MIL
46. Mitch Maier, OF, KC
47. J.R. Taylor, SS, MIN
48. Brendan Ryan, SS, STL
49. Corey Hart, OF, MIL
50. Jeff Salazar, OF, COL
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