Garrett Whitlock Archives - River Avenue Blues

An Important Year in the Farm System [2019 Season Preview]

March 26, 2019 by Mike

Two years ago the Yankees had arguably the top farm system in baseball. Uncharacteristically, they traded veterans for prospects at the 2016 trade deadline, and several of their own players took big steps forward with their development. Gleyber Torres came over in the Aroldis Chapman trade. Aaron Judge, Luis Severino, Gary Sanchez, and Miguel Andujar? All originally drafted or signed by the Yankees.

That monster farm system of two years ago has become a powerhouse MLB team. The Yankees surprisingly won 91 games in 2017, not-so-surprisingly won 100 games in 2018, and now they go into 2019 on the very short list of realistic World Series contenders. They’ve graduated or traded many top prospects, and have tumbled down the farm system rankings as a result:

Baseball America: 20th
Baseball Prospectus: 12th
Keith Law: 19th

“Being ranked as everybody’s top farm system isn’t our goal. Our goal is to be ranked as winning the World Series,” said amateur scouting director Damon Oppenheimer to Greg Joyce last month. “… Everything’s a cycle in this thing. You get to a point where, if you’re going to try to win, you end up trading prospects. So we’ve traded quite a few guys over the last few years to help us acquire talent to help us win at the big league level, and that’s what we’re there to do. We’re in one of those cycles now where we gotta dump some more guys into the system.”

As the big league team contends this summer, the farm system will be in something of a rebuild, in that they have a plethora of young low minors prospects looking to take that step toward becoming the next wave of great Yankees prospects. The high-end upper minors talent isn’t there like it has been the last two years, and that could be an issue come trade deadline time. Time to preview the year ahead in the farm system.

Top Prospects Who Could Help This Season

There is only one: RHP Jonathan Loaisiga. In fact, the Yankees’ No. 2 prospect is set to join the rotation in a few days, after CC Sabathia’s five-game suspension ends. That is almost certainly a temporary move with Sabathia due to return in mid-April and Luis Severino hopefully sometime in early-May. Loaisiga is going to join the Yankees soon though, and that gives him a chance to help the team and force the club to keep him around longer.

Of course, Loaisiga has a long injury history and very limited experience (184.1 career innings!), plus he has never thrown a pitch in Triple-A, so he would presumably benefit from some Triple-A time. I imagine he’ll be returned to the minors at some point. Loaisiga has a quality three-pitch mix as well as good control, plus he seems unflappable on the mound, which are good traits for a young pitcher. Point is, Loaisiga is the only high-end upper minors prospect we figure to see in the Bronx this year.

Top Prospects Who (Probably) Won’t Help This Season

OF Estevan Florial, the Yankees’ top prospect, will begin the season on the injured list after breaking his wrist crashing into the outfield wall this spring. I suppose the good news is he’ll only be in a cast three weeks, meaning his recovery may not be as long as you’d expect. Three weeks in a cast seems to indicate he could be back in games sometime in May. That would be ideal. We’ll see.

The injury is unfortunate because Florial has a clear flaw in his pitch recognition — “I’m a young player. It’s tough to know what pitch to select. Try to know the pitch I can drive, and what I can’t, too,” Florial said to Brendan Kuty last month — and the only way to improve on that is with game reps. There’s no substitute for seeing live action pitching. Florial missed time with wrist surgery last year, so he has a lot of catching up to do. Once healthy, he’ll likely go to High-A Tampa or Double-A Trenton. Either way, we won’t see Florial in the big leagues this summer.

After Florial and Loaisiga, the next five best prospects in the farm system are all teenagers: C Anthony Seigler, OF Everson Pereira, OF Antonio Cabello, RHP Deivi Garcia, and RHP Roansy Contreras. On one hand, hooray for having so many very talented teenagers. On the other hand, none of those guys will come close to sniffing the big leagues. Seigler, Pereira, and Cabello may not even see full season ball this year, and Contreras could spend the entire season with Low-A Charleston.

Garcia made one Double-A spot start at the end of last season but he is unlikely to start this season at that level. Not after making only six (excellent) starts with High-A Tampa. Seems to me Deivi will return to Tampa for a few weeks before being bumped back up to Trenton. His best case scenario will be a late-season cameo with Triple-A Scranton. If we see Garcia in the big leagues this year, either something went very right (he really broke out) or very wrong (everyone got hurt).

Secondary Prospects Likely To Help This Season

The Yankees will have at least one of their non-top prospects on the Opening Day roster. LHP Stephen Tarpley, who pitched well last September and was great this spring, will be in the bullpen. He definitely has a chance to carve out a long-term role this summer. In all likelihood though, Tarpley will ride the shuttle up and down a few times. That’s just how it goes for a young reliever with options, especially when he’s the last guy in the bullpen.

Another reliever we could see at some point: RHP Domingo Acevedo. Lindsey Adler says Acevedo pitched in relief in minor league camp this spring and the Yankees wouldn’t do that unless he was moving into the bullpen full-time. I’m definitely down with this. Acevedo has struggled to stay healthy as a starter and he still hasn’t developed his slider into a reliable third pitch. Let him air it out for an inning at a time with the big fastball (and changeup) and there’s a chance very good things will happen. I’m looking forward to seeing Acevedo in short relief stints.

RHP Chance Adams and RHP Mike King are the top two Triple-A depth starters at the moment, though King suffered a stress reaction in his elbow early in camp, and is still working his way back. He’s expected to join the RailRiders in early May. Once he does, King could jump ahead of Adams on the call-up list. He had a monster 2018 season statistically and, at least prior to the injury, had firmer stuff and control than Adams, who’s taken a step back the last two seasons. Still, Adams is on the 40-man roster, so we’ll see him work shuttle duty at some point.

Double-A hurlers RHP Trevor Stephan, RHP Garrett Whitlock, and RHP Nick Nelson probably will not see the big leagues this summer. They’re not on the 40-man roster yet — Stephan and Whitlock don’t have to be added to the 40-man until after next season — and there are a few guys ahead of them on the depth chart, but, anytime you begin the season in Double-A, you have a chance to play in MLB. They will, they do. Pitch well in Double-A and they’ll find themselves in Triple-A in short order, and force a call-up conversation.

The Mike Tauchman pickup and Tyler Wade demotion makes it less likely we will see IF Thairo Estrada this year, or at least see him anytime soon, especially after a lost season last year. A few weeks (months?) worth of at-bats with Triple-A Scranton is what Estrada needs right now, but, if the Yankees have a need at the MLB level and he’s the best option, they will call him up. I imagine we’ll see Thairo as at least a September call-up this summer.

Breakout Candidates

This is where all that young low minors talent comes into play. Guys like Seigler, Pereira, Cabello, and Contreras are prime breakout candidates who could put themselves into the top 100 prospect discussion after the season. (Deivi broke out last year, I’d say.) Pereira and Cabello in particular are very high upside players who could very well rank 1-2 in the farm system in a few months. They’re that good and that talented.

This year’s Pereira and Cabello, meaning the highly regarded international signings set to make their pro debut, should be OF Kevin Alcantara and RHP Osiel Rodriguez. Alcantara ($1M bonus) stood out for his hitting ability when he signed and he’s already growing into some power. Rodriguez ($600,000) boasts a deep power arsenal and, like many Cuban pitchers, he throws from a variety of arm angles to create deception.

Hard-throwing RHP Luis Gil kinda sorta broke out last year, and he might have the best fastball in the farm system. He’s upper-90s regularly and has a high spin rate on everything. Gil is the quintessential modern pitching prospect. RHP Juan Then and RHP Yoendrys Gomez are other young low minors guys who stand out more for their know-how and pitchability than lighting up the radar gun. That said, neither guy is short on stuff.

A few levels higher, the Yankees are finally set to turn 2017 first round pick RHP Clarke Schmidt loose. He returned from Tommy John surgery last year and pitched well in limited action. The Yankees will not be reckless with Schmidt — they don’t have him penciled him for 180 innings or anything — but he’ll finally get a chance to hold down a rotation spot and show what he can do. He’s been an afterthought since being drafted because of the Tommy John surgery. Schmidt’s kinda like adding a new prospect to the system all together.

Second tier outfield prospects like OF Josh Stowers and OF Anthony Garcia may not have the pure upside that Pereira and Cabello offer, though they do bring a lot to the table. In Garcia’s case, that means a lot of power. A lot. He’s a switch-hitter who can hit the ball a mile from both sides of the plate. Stowers is more well-rounded and will impact the game a lot of different ways. Offensively, defensively, on the bases, etc. He strikes me as a sneaky good breakout candidate.

Between international free agency and trades (Gil, Stowers, and Then were all acquired in trades), the Yankees have stocked the lower levels of the minors with exciting talent, and it was all by design. They picked up these kids very early in their careers — over the winter they traded for a pitching prospect yet to appear in a pro game — and will try to develop them into the next wave of top prospects. That’s the plan. The farm system may lack upper minors talent. In the low minors though, forget it. The Yankees are stacked, and that equals a small army of breakout candidates.

Returning From Injury

Technically, RHP Albert Abreu finished last year healthy, though injuries have given him trouble since coming over from the Astros in the Brian McCann trade. The power four-pitch mix is impressive. The lack of control and lack of durability are not. More than anything at this point, Abreu needs reps so he can work on refining his game. A full healthy season would be welcome in 2019. It could also land him a big league call-up at some point.

RHP Freicer Perez is a more traditional injury comeback story. He made six ugly starts last season before undergoing season-ending shoulder surgery. The good news? Perez only had bone spurs removed. His labrum, rotator cuff, and capsule are all intact. A lost season is a lost season though, and this year Perez will look to get back on track with a healthy shoulder. He went into last year as one of the top prospects in the system. Getting back to that level after shoulder surgery remains possible.

The forgotten pitching prospect in the system is RHP Glenn Otto, the Yankees’ fifth round pick in 2017. He made two starts with Low-A Charleston last year before having season-ending surgery to remove a blood clot from his shoulder. Yikes. When healthy, Otto showed a good low-to-mid-90s fastball with a hammer high-spin curveball that is seemingly allergic to bats. There were questions about his durability and changeup even before the surgery, but, even if Otto is a reliever long-term, he could be a good one. His coming out party is set for this summer.

Make or Break Year?

The 2014-15 international spending spree, while well-intended, has worked out very poorly. Florial is far and away the best prospect to come out of that signing class and he was a small bonus guy later in the signing period, not a headliner. Many of those 2014-15 kids have already washed out. Others, like 3B Dermis Garcia and SS Hoy Jun Park, still have some prospect value. Not much, but some.

Garcia’s calling call remains (and always will be) his power. He moved down the defensive spectrum to first base last year — apparently he’s going to give third base another try this year — and plans to turn him into a two-way player were apparently put on hold. Dermis did throw bullpen sessions late last season but he never appeared in a game as a pitcher. Alas. Garcia will move up to High-A Tampa this year after two seasons with Low-A Charleston. Another year of contact and defensive issues mean you can probably close the book on his days as a serious prospect.

After Florial, Park probably has the best chance to reach the big leagues among 2014-15 signees. He’s a very good defensive middle infielder who draws a lot of walks and can steal bases, but is short on power and exit velocity. Power is tough to project these days because of changes to the baseball, so perhaps we shouldn’t ding Park too much. He has a chance to rebuild some prospect stock with Double-A Trenton this year. The concern is advanced pitchers will knock the bat out of his hands. This is a big year for Park.

IF Kyle Holder has Major League ready defensive tools, but he hasn’t hit much in his career to date, and we haven’t seen much progress either. To be fair to Holder, he dealt with serious injury (broken vertebrae) and off-the-field matters (his brother passed away) last season, so we should cut him a break on the lack of development. That said, he is a soon-to-be 25-year-old defensive wiz with little to offer at the plate. Another year without much offensive progress and it’ll be time to look ahead to other infield prospects.

I think OF Isiah Gilliam has reached make or break status as well. He’s closing in on his 23rd birthday and saw marked declines in his power output, his walk rate, and his strikeout rate after moving from Low-A Charleston to High-A Tampa last season. As a non-elite bat-only corner outfielder, it doesn’t take much to get left behind. Gilliam has to rebound with a strong season this year, likely back with Tampa, to avoid becoming an afterthought.

Prospects I Am Excited About

Gosh, there are lots. Seigler, Pereira, and Contreras are at the top of the list. I also can’t give up on RHP Luis Medina yet, even after he walked 46 batters in 36 rookie ball innings last year. Medina turns only 20 in May, and he lights up the radar gun with his fastball and has a knee-buckling high-spin curveball, and I just can’t give up on that despite the extreme control problems. Medina’s going to be a long-term project and I am willing to be patient because the upside is so great.

OF Raimfer Salinas should be in the Pereira and Cabello group — Salinas ($1.85M) received a larger signing bonus than Pereira ($1.4M) and Cabello ($1.35M), which tells you how much the Yankees like him — but finger and knee injuries cut short his pro debut last year. When healthy, he features an advanced approach at the plate with some power, as well as very good defensive chops. Salinas probably belongs in the “Breakout Candidates” group. I really like him. He has a lot of ability.

OF Pablo Olivares has long been a personal favorite with his “do everything well but nothing exceptionally” skill set. RHP Frank German and RHP Tanner Myatt are two 2018 draftees I like for different reasons. German has already gained velocity as a pro and features a nice little slider. Myatt is a huge (6-foot-7) extreme hard-thrower (up to 101 mph) with an occasionally great curveball. He reminds me a bit of Kyle Farnsworth, which I know will drive some people nuts, but Farnsworth played 16 years in the big leagues as a late-inning reliever. That would be a heck of an outcome for an 11th round pick like Myatt.

Will The Yankees Trade Any Of These Guys?

Of course they will. The Yankees are a win-now team, so if when they need help at the trade deadline, they will trade prospects in an effort to get over the hump. They did it the last two trade deadlines and there’s no reason to think they won’t do it again this year. That’s the entire point of a farm system. To help address big league roster needs, either by graduating prospects to the show, or by using them as trade chips.

To me, Nelson stands out as a potential trade candidate. He will be Rule 5 Draft after the season and I get the feeling he falls into the same category as Dillon Tate and Josh Rogers last year. The “good prospect the Yankees don’t really know what to do with who is on the 40-man roster bubble” group. The other Double-A arms like Abreu, Stephan, Whitlock could all become trade candidates given the club’s lack of high-end Triple-A talent. Double-A starters are the next best thing.

Even before the injury, I don’t think the Yankees would’ve hesitated for a second to trade Florial in the right deal. Would they give him away? No way. But Florial is their best chance to acquire an impact player on July 31st. As long as he comes back from the wrist injury well, his trade value should remain intact. The Yankees professed their love for Justus Sheffield right up until they traded him. I could see the same happening with Florial.

The Yankees traded 15 prospects in the days leading up to the last two trade deadlines. Some were big names (Blake Rutherford, James Kaprielian, Jorge Mateo, etc.) and many were second and third tier guys (Josh Rogers, Billy McKinney, Luis Rijo, Zack Littell). I think the Yankees are at the point where no prospect is off-limits. I thought Gleyber Torres was untouchable as it gets two years ago. Now? There’s no one in the system like that. Not even close.

Where Does The System Go From Here?

Because the system is built mainly around pitching and very young low minors prospects, the Yankees have a boom or bust farm system right now. If the pitchers stay healthy and some of those teenagers figure it out, this could again be one of the top systems in baseball, and I mean as soon as next spring. The Yankees have gotten pretty good at developing players, thankfully. The chances of a farm system breakout in 2019 aren’t small.

Then again, if some of those pitchers get hurt — I have 18 pitchers in my top 30 prospects list and normal attrition suggests a few of them are going to feel something that requires a lengthy shutdown, that’s just baseball — and those teenagers need more than one or two pro seasons to hit their stride, the Yankees will again have a system ranked in the bottom half of the league next year. It’s not the end of the world, but a great farm system is a heck of a lot more fun than a mediocre one.

“I believe our system is one of the stronger ones in the game. It’s just the timing of everything. (The top talent) just happens to be at the lower levels. We are very pitching deep with a lot of high-end young arms,” said Brian Cashman to Randy Miller last month. “I’m not saying the system rankings are wrong. I will tell you this: As long as our guys stay healthy and develop the way we think they’re capable of developing, the system rankings are going to be radically different next year.”

Previewing the Yankees’ potential non-roster Spring Training invitees for 2019

January 22, 2019 by Mike

Three weeks from tomorrow pitchers and catchers will report to Tampa to begin Spring Training 2019. And, at some point between now and then, the Yankees will announce their non-roster invitees. Those are non-40-man roster players they are bringing to Major League Spring Training. All other non-40-man players go to minor league camp at the Himes Complex across the street.

Non-roster invitees come in all shapes and sizes. Some are top prospects and some are mid-range prospects. Others are veteran journeymen trying to hang on. Teams usually bring 20-25 non-roster players to camp each last year. Last spring the Yankees had 20 non-roster players in camp. Two years ago it was 23. Expect a similar amount this spring. The 40-man roster plus 20-25 non-roster invitees equals 60-65 total players in Spring Training.

So, with the non-roster invitee list due to be announced in the near future, I figured this is as good a time as any to look at the minor leaguers who could find themselves in big league camp this year. Some are obvious. Many aren’t. Let’s break this down position-by-position.

Catchers

(40-Man Roster Players: Kyle Higashioka, Austin Romine, Gary Sanchez)

Every year every team invites a bunch of non-roster catchers to Spring Training. Why? Because who else is supposed to catch all those bullpen sessions and simulated games? The workload has to be spread around. And remember, Sanchez is coming back from offseason shoulder surgery. It was his non-throwing shoulder, but still. The Yankees will take it easy on him in February and March because they don’t want to put him at risk of missing time between April and November. Expect to see plenty of non-roster catchers against this spring.

Do not, however, expect to see Anthony Seigler or Josh Breaux, the Yankees’ top two picks in last year’s draft. It is not the appropriate place for them at this point of their careers. Only once in the last 13 years have the Yankees brought their first round pick in the previous year’s draft to Spring Training as a non-roster player. That was James Kaprielian in 2016. Ian Kennedy and Joba Chamberlain didn’t even get non-roster invites in 2007. Seigler and Breaux won’t be in big league camp. It’s not their time.

My Prediction: Francisco Diaz, Ryan Lavarnway, Ryan Lidge, Donny Sands. Add in the three 40-man roster guys and that’s seven catchers total. Plenty for bullpens. Lavarnway signed a minor league deal and has big league time, so it’s safe to assume he’ll be a non-roster guy. Diaz has been a non-roster invitee each of the last three years. The Yankees re-signed him as a minor league free agent a few weeks ago and I’m sure he’ll again be in camp as a non-roster guy.

Lidge was the Yankees’ 20th round pick in 2017 and he played most of his games last year with Double-A Trenton. A catcher with Double-A time is prime “someone to catch spring bullpens” fodder. I’m on the fence about Sands. He has no Double-A time and only 42 High-A games under his belt. I’m just not sure who else it would be with Chace Numata and Jorge Saez, non-roster catchers last year, no longer in the organization. Maybe the Yankees have a low profile catcher signing coming? I could see it. I feel good about Diaz, Lavarnway, and Lidge. The seventh spot is a little more wide open.

Infielders

(40-Man Roster Players: Miguel Andujar, Greg Bird, Thairo Estrada, Didi Gregorius, DJ LeMahieu, Gleyber Torres, Troy Tulowitzki, Luke Voit, Tyler Wade)

The Yankees currently have nine infielders on the 40-man roster. Nine! That’s a ton. One of them is Gregorius, who won’t actually play in Spring Training because he’s rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, but eight 40-man infielders is still a lot. Torres and Andujar are locked into positions now — that wasn’t the case last spring — but there’s the Tulowitzki comeback attempt and LeMahieu learning how to be a utility guy, so there will be some infield intrigue in Spring Training.

Almost every notable infield prospect in the organization is already on the 40-man roster. Kyle Holder is the exception. He was in camp as a non-roster player last spring. He also played only 48 games last season due to injury and family matters, and he was passed over in the Rule 5 Draft. I still think the Yankees like him enough to bring him to camp as a non-roster guy. Holder’s a relatively recent high draft pick and gosh can the kid play defense. If you stuck around to watch the late innings of Grapefruit League games last year, you saw him play a beautiful shortstop.

Lower level infield prospects like Diego Castillo, Dermis Garcia, and Hoy Jun Park are not non-roster caliber players. Not right now and, given their development in recent years, maybe not ever. In most other years I’d be tempted to say Brandon Wagner is a non-roster candidate. He reached Double-A last season and finished one off the farm system home run lead. That said, there will be so many 40-man roster infielders in camp this year that I think Wagner gets squeezed out. There are only so many at-bats to go around.

My Prediction: Holder and Gio Urshela. Urshela, like Lavarnway, signed a minor league deal earlier this offseason and has big league time. He’ll be in Spring Training as a non-roster dude. Holder, Urshela, and the 40-man roster guys give the Yankees ten infielders for camp, not including Gregorius. Voit and Bird are the only true first basemen among those ten, but LeMahieu is apparently going to play some first, and both Lavarnway and Diaz have played the position as well. Maybe we’ll even see Andujar at first base. Either way, the Yankees are covered.

Outfielders

(40-Man Roster Players: Jacoby Ellsbury, Clint Frazier, Brett Gardner, Aaron Hicks, Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton)

Frazier was recently cleared to play in Spring Training and that’s great news. I’m looking forward to seeing what he does with good health this season. Ellsbury, on the other hand, is coming back from hip surgery and a few weeks ago Brian Cashman admitted Ellsbury is questionable for Opening Day. If he’s questionable for Opening Day, then he’s questionable for Spring Training. So that’s really five healthy 40-man roster outfielders.

The Yankees have several near elite center field prospects but only one, Estevan Florial, will get a Spring Training invite. He was in camp as a non-roster player last spring and will be back this year as the team’s top prospect. Others like Everson Pereira and Antonio Cabello will be in minor league camp. Pereira is 17 and Cabello is 18. They are babies. Big league camp is not the right place for them. (Also, Cabello is coming back from offseason shoulder surgery, which is another reason to send him to minor league camp.)

With only five healthy 40-man roster outfielders — and one of those five was only recently cleared for full-fledged baseball activities — it seems to me the Yankees will bring at least one upper level depth outfielder to camp as a non-roster player. The likely candidates: Trey Amburgey, Jeff Hendrix, and Zack Zehner. Hendrix saw quite a bit of time as a minor league call-up in road games last spring. Amburgey is the best prospect of the bunch though, and prospect status tends to break ties.

My Prediction: Amburgey, Florial, Billy Burns, Matt Lipka. Burns and Lipka signed minor league deals earlier this month and the Yankees officially announced both contracts include an invitation to Spring Training, so there you go. There’s no mystery here. They’ll be there. Amburgey, Burns, Florial, and Lipka plus the five healthy 40-man roster guys would give the Yankees nine outfielders in Spring Training. Wade can play the outfield too, so that’s ten. That’s plenty. Part of me wonders if we’ll see LeMahieu out there at some point.

Right-handers

(40-Man Roster Players: Albert Abreu, Domingo Acevedo, Chance Adams, Dellin Betances, Luis Cessa, Domingo German, Chad Green, Joe Harvey, Ben Heller, Jonathan Holder, Tommy Kahnle, Jonathan Loaisiga, Luis Severino, Masahiro Tanaka, and eventually Adam Ottavino)

Heller is rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, so he’s a Spring Training non-factor. I’m looking forward to seeing Abreu and Acevedo in Grapefruit League action, personally. Abreu missed camp last year after having his appendix removed and Acevedo was held back because he spent part of the offseason recovering from a shoulder issue and his velocity was down. I also want to see Harvey because I’ve never seen him before, and Kahnle because I’m curious about his velocity. Hopefully it returns.

Anyway, the Yankees are loaded with pitching prospects. Too bad so many of them are in the low minors. You’re not going to see Luis Medina or Roansy Contreras or even Deivi Garcia in big league camp. Garcia is at best a maybe. I’m not saying that because I don’t like him as a prospect. I do. I’m saying that because history suggests the Yankees will not bring a 19-year-old pitching prospect to big league camp. It’s just not something they do. It’s not something many teams do, in fact.

The second tier pitching prospects though, the 20-somethings with Double-A (and in some cases Triple-A) time? We’ll see a few in camp. Always do. Mike King is an obvious yes. Do what he did last year while reaching Triple-A and you’ve earned yourself a non-roster invite. There’s a pretty good chance King will be called up at some point in 2019 and the Yankees will want him to get to know his teammates and coaches before that, and vice versa. Spring Training is the time to do it. King’s as easy a yes as it gets.

Nick Nelson, Trevor Stephan, and Garrett Whitlock are all potential non-roster candidates as well. So is Clarke Schmidt, the Yankees’ first round pick two years ago, in my opinion. He completed his Tommy John surgery rehab last season and pitched well in his limited game action. The Yankees are set to turn him loose this year and my hunch is that includes a Spring Training invite. He’ll probably be among the first cuts, but I think he’ll be there.

My Prediction: King, Nelson, Schmidt, Raynel Espinal, Danny Farquhar, Drew Hutchison, Brady Lail, one TBD spot. The Yankees reportedly want a swingman/sixth starter type to replace Sonny Gray, hence that TBD spot. Maybe they wind up getting a lefty instead. I’ll play the odds and predict a righty. Anyway, Farquhar and Hutchison signed minor league deals and have big league time, so they’ll be in camp. In fact, the Yankees announced Hutchison’s deal includes a spring invite, so there you go.

Lail’s been a non-roster guy each of the last three years — the Yankees seem to like him despite never calling him up or protecting him from the Rule 5 Draft — and I see no reason to think this spring will be any different. Espinal was a non-roster guy last year and he had a strong Triple-A season, so I think he’s back as well. He’s a potential inventory arm, someone who comes up in an emergency, and candidates for an emergency call-up usually get a Spring Training invite.

I’m going with Nelson over Stephan and Whitlock because, well, I’m kinda guessing here. I think at least one of those three gets a non-roster invite, and Nelson is both the oldest and has been in the system the longest, so I think it’ll be him. If the Yankees bring any other righties to big league camp, I think it’s more likely it’ll be a random Triple-A reliever like Cale Coshow or J.P. Feyereisen than Stephan or Whitlock. Between Hutchison, King, Nelson, and Schmidt, that is plenty of extra multi-inning pitchers.

Left-handers

(40-Man Roster Players: Zach Britton, Aroldis Chapman, J.A. Happ, Jordan Montgomery, James Paxton, CC Sabathia, Stephen Tarpley)

Montgomery is still rehabbing from Tommy John surgery and we won’t see him in Grapefruit League games. We might not even see him throw bullpens in Spring Training. Montgomery had his elbow rebuild in June and pitchers usually don’t get back up on a mound until 8-10 months into the rehab process. He’ll just be getting to that point as Spring Training begins, which means little to no action. A bummer, but not a surprise.

The Yankees do not have any notable left-handed pitching prospects now that Justus Sheffield (and Josh Rogers) has been traded. Their best lefty pitching prospect is, uh, Nestor Cortes? Phil Diehl? Not great. Diehl had a statistically excellent 2018 season (2.51 ERA and 2.24 FIP with 36.2% strikeouts and 7.7% walks) and the Yankees had him throw simulated at-bats to Judge late in the season, when Judge was coming back from his wrist injury, which tells us the Yankees trust Diehl’s control. Otherwise they wouldn’t have let him pitch to the most valuable player in the organization and risk his wrist getting hit again. Maybe they’ll bring him to camp? Dunno.

My Prediction: Cortes, Diehl, Rex Brothers, Danny Coulombe. Brothers and Coulombe are on minor league contracts and both have quite a bit of big league time, so we know they’ll be in camp. Cortes was in big league camp with the Orioles as a Rule 5 Draft pick last spring — he even made their Opening Day roster — and he had yet another statistically excellent season last year. I think that’s enough to get him to Spring Training this year. Diehl is the token extra lefty reliever.

* * *

Alright, so putting that all together, we come away with 22 potential non-roster invitees to Spring Training. Those 22 players:

Catchers (4): Diaz, Lavarnway, Lidge, Sands or a TBD catcher
Infielders (2): Holder, Urshela
Outfielders (4): Amburgey, Burns, Florial, Lipka
Righties (8): Espinal, Farquhar, Hutchison, King, Lail, Nelson, Schmidt, TBD
Lefties (4): Brothers, Cortes, Coulombe, Diehl

On one hand, the Yankees had 20 non-roster players in camp last year, 23 the year before that, and 26 in each of the two years before that. Twenty-two this year would be a typical number of non-roster players. On the other hand, the Yankees have at least three (Ellsbury, Heller, Montgomery) and possibly four (Sanchez) 40-man roster players who will be either restricted or completely off-limits in Spring Training. The Yankees might carry more non-roster players than usual to cover for the rehabbing 40-man roster guys.

The farm system isn’t as strong or as deep as it was a few years ago, mostly because the Yankees have graduated so many of their top prospects to the big leagues. Remember when we all couldn’t wait to see Torres or Judge or Severino in camp as non-roster guys? Now they’re no doubt big leaguers. Florial and King will be the obvious “must see” prospects on this year’s non-roster list and, if they get invited, Nelson and Schmidt will be worth watching as well. Also, bet on there being some surprise non-roster invitees this spring. There are always a few.

Prospect Profile: Garrett Whitlock

January 16, 2019 by Mike

Garrett Whitlock | RHP

Background
Whitlock, 22, grew up outside Atlanta in Snellville, Georgia. He played four years of baseball at Providence Christian Academy and posted a 0.62 ERA as a senior. Despite that, Baseball America (subs. req’d) did rank him among the top 500 prospects for the 2015 draft, and he went undrafted out of high school. Whitlock followed through on his commitment to the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

As a freshman with the Blazers in 2016, Whitlock worked almost exclusively in relief, throwing 51 innings with a 3.00 ERA and a 46/21 K/BB. He made one start and 24 relief appearances. Whitlock headed to the Cape Cod League for summer ball and struck out eight in six shutout innings for the Chatham Anglers. Given his limited workload, it should be no surprise Whitlock did not make Jim Callis’ top ten Cape Cod League prospects that year.

Whitlock moved into the rotation as a sophomore in 2017 and in fact he drew UAB’s Opening Day start. He got off to an excellent start to the season before suffering a back strain that sent him to the sidelines for a while, and pushed him into a relief role when he returned. His effectiveness waned and Whitlock finished the spring with a 4.03 ERA and 44/24 K/BB in 60 innings. Not the breakout year he was hoping to put together.

Because he turned 21 within 45 days of the draft, Whitlock was draft-eligible as a sophomore in 2017, and Baseball America (subs. req’d) ranked him the 331st best prospect in the draft class. The Yankees selected him in the 18th round (542nd overall) and paid him an above-slot $247,500 bonus*. Whitlock had leverage because, as a draft-eligible sophomore, he could return to school for his junior year and reenter the draft in 2018.

* Every dollar over $125,000 given to a player drafted after the tenth round counts against the bonus pool, so Whitlock came with a $122,500 bonus pool charge.

Pro Career
Whitlock signed on draft signing deadline day, so he didn’t get many innings under his belt during his pro debut in 2017. He allowed seven runs in 14.1 rookie ball innings split between the Gulf Coast League and Appalachian League. On the bright side, Whitlock struck out 22 and walked zero in those 14.1 innings. Not much to his pro debut.

The Yankees sent Whitlock to Low-A Charleston to begin last season and he carved up South Atlantic League hitters, throwing 40 innings with a 1.13 ERA (2.27 FIP) and strong strikeout (29.7%), walk (4.7%), and ground ball (62.0%) rates. A promotion to High-A Tampa followed. Whitlock had a 2.44 ERA (3.11 FIP) in 70 innings with Tampa. His strikeout (25.1%), walk (9.2%), and grounder (50.5%) rates were solid.

A two-appearance cameo with Double-A Trenton was uneven (10.2 IP, 10 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 7 BB, 4 K) — Whitlock actually jumped from Low-A to Double-A for a spot start in April — and Whitlock finished his first full pro season with a 1.86 ERA (3.01 FIP) in 120.2 total innings. The strikeout (24.9%), walk (8.4%), and ground ball (53.0%) numbers were good. His 1.86 ERA was fourth lowest among the 510 pitchers to throw at least 100 innings in the minors in 2018.

Scouting Report
The Yankees bet an 18th round pick and a $247,500 bonus on Whitlock returning to form as he got further away from the back injury and that’s exactly what happened. This past season the right-hander showed the same low-to-mid-90s sinking two-seam fastball he had as a freshman and on the Cape, and the Yankees also had him start throwing four-seam fastballs up in the zone to change eye levels.

Whitlock boasts two solid secondary pitches in his power slider and changeup. The Yankees have helped him gain consistency with his slider, which sometimes looked like a slider and sometimes looked like a curveball in college. Now it is a slider, definitively. The changeup is a quality pitch as well and allows him to neutralize left-handed batters. Whitlock is a true-four pitch pitcher with a four-seamer, a sinker, a slider, and a changeup.

There is a little funk in Whitlock’s delivery and it allows him to hide the ball well, so he has four distinct pitches and deception. Not bad. Throwing strikes has never been much of a problem for Whitlock. His command — the ability to pitch at the knees and to the corners of the plate — must improve across the board, however. That’s not unusual for a pitching prospect with one full season under his belt though.

On the durability front, Whitlock has had no injury problems aside from his poorly timed back strain during his sophomore season at UAB — he might’ve been a top five rounds pick with a healthy back that spring — and he has plenty of size (6-foot-5 and 190 lbs.). Enough that you could see him adding velocity should he add a little more muscle.

2019 Outlook
After ripping through two levels of Single-A ball last season, Whitlock is all but certain to begin the 2019 season with Double-A Trenton. I have to think the Yankees are hoping he can pitch his way up to Triple-A Scranton at some point as well. Half a season in Trenton and half a season in Scranton would be ideal. I’d bet against Whitlock making his MLB debut this year — he doesn’t have to be added to the 40-man roster for Rule 5 Draft purposes until the 2020-21 offseason — but don’t be surprised if the Yankees bring him to Spring Training as a non-roster invitee.

My Take
I really like Whitlock. The Yankees have become quite good at developing mid-to-late round arms (Chance Adams, Cody Carroll, Jordan Montgomery, Josh Rogers, Caleb Smith, Taylor Widener, etc.) into big league pieces or trade chips, and Whitlock appears to belong in that mix. He has a deep enough arsenal and good enough control to start, which is quite valuable even if he’s only a back-end guy. In relief, he could really be something. Part of me wonders whether Whitlock is more trade chip than big league option because he’s not a huge velocity guy and the Yankees usually steer clear of middling velocity righties. Either way, what a get in the 18th round.

A New Era in the Farm System [2018 Season Review]

December 6, 2018 by Mike

It has been a crazy few years in the farm system. The Yankees had a middle of the pack system on Opening Day 2016. By the end of that season it was arguably the best farm system in the game, mostly because of the team’s trade deadline sell-off, but also because several guys who were already in the system broke out. Since the end of the 2016 season, that strong farm system has provided a steady pipeline of talent to the Bronx.

The farm system now is not what the farm system was then because of graduations and trades (and injuries and poor performances), which is what we all expected. If you have great prospects, you want them to become great big leaguers and leave the farm system behind. That is exactly what’s happened for the Yankees. The system is back to being middle of the pack now, maybe even worse, and for all the right reasons. Let’s review the year that was down in the minors.

The Graduates

The last two seasons (two and a half, really) have been incredible in terms of graduating prospects from the farm system to the big leagues. Gary Sanchez arrived in 2016. Last year it was Aaron Judge, Jordan Montgomery, and Chad Green. This season the Yankees graduated 3B Miguel Andujar (season review) and IF Gleyber Torres (season review) to the big leagues, and they finished second and third in the AL Rookie of the Year voting, respectively. They came into the season as the top two position player prospects in the farm system.

Also graduating to MLB this year were RHP Jonathan Holder (season review), RHP Domingo German (season review), and IF Tyler Wade (season review). Wade actually exhausted his rookie eligibility last season through service time, but it wasn’t until this year that he exceeded the 130 at-bat rookie limit. Four of my preseason top 30 Yankees prospects joined the Yankees and exhausted their rookie eligibility this season. (Five of the top ten and six of the top 13 on my 2017 list have since graduated to the Yankees.) As a result, the Yankees had the fourth highest rookie WAR in baseball in 2018.

The New Top Prospect

Up until two and a half weeks ago, the Yankees’ top prospect was LHP Justus Sheffield (season review), who pitched well with Triple-A Scranton this season and struggled during his brief MLB cameo. The Yankees cashed him in as a trade chip last month to land James Paxton, who is essentially what we all hoped Sheffield would one day become. Sheffield still has work to do with his command and that made it unlikely he would contribute to the Yankees as a starter in a significant way in 2019. It also made it easier for the win now Yankees to trade him.

With Sheffield traded the new top prospect in the organization is OF Estevan Florial and almost by default too. All those graduations and trades the last two years have thinned the farm system considerably. That is the cost of doing business. You can either have a great farm system or a great big league team. Having both at the same time is damn near impossible nowadays with the draft and international free agency spending restrictions. I will happily live with a thinned out farm system while the Yankees field a 100-win team in the Bronx.

Anyway, Florial had a difficult season in 2018. He started the year with High-A Tampa, hit .246/.353/.343 (107 wRC+) with one home run in his first 36 games, then went down with wrist surgery. Hamate bone removal sidelined him for seven weeks. Florial wrecked the rookie Gulf Coast League during his rehab assignment (.548/.600/1.000 in nine games), then managed a .263/.355/.375 (112 wRC+) line with two homers in his final 39 games with Tampa. Florial hit a weak .178/.294/.260 in 21 Arizona Fall League games after the season.

The bad news? Well, pretty much all of it. Florial needed wrist surgery and he didn’t perform all that well this season, though it is entirely possible (if not likely) the wrist injury contributed to that. He could’ve been (likely was) playing hurt before surgery, and it usually takes some time to get back to normal after wrist surgery, so yeah. The good news? Florial’s contact numbers improved:

2017 in Low-A: 31.9% strikeouts and 15.2% swings and misses
2018 in High-A: 25.7% strikeouts and 13.1% swings and misses

Florial also improved his walk rate as well, going from 10.5% walks in 2017 to 13.0% walks in 2018, but that doesn’t do much for me. Minor league walk rates are fickle, especially in Single-A ball, where most pitchers are control-challenged. Moving up a level and shaving more than six percentage points off your strikeout rate is not nothing though. Contact is Florial’s biggest weakness — he is a four-tool player and the one tool he lacks is the hit tool, and that is a tantalizing profile with a high bust rate — and hopefully those contact gains this year are real.

The Breakout Prospects

King. (Jason Farmer/Scranton Times-Tribune)

It was a good year for pitching prospects in the farm system. The Yankees don’t have a future ace in the system — there are only a handful of those guys in the minors — but they are loaded with potential starters and depth arms, among them RHP Jonathan Loaisiga (season review). Many of those pitching prospects took a step forward this season and cemented themselves as legitimate big league prospects who may not be more than a year or two away from the show.

Statistically, the biggest breakout prospect in the system this year was RHP Mike King, who came over from the Marlins in last winter’s Caleb Smith/Garrett Cooper roster shuffle trade. King rose three levels this season and finished the year with Triple-A Scranton, posting a 1.79 ERA (2.76 FIP) with 24.4% strikeouts and 4.7% walks in a whopping 161.1 innings. King is a fastball command guy whose secondary stuff is good but not great, so he’s a stats before scouting report prospect. Still, have that much success and reach Triple-A, and you’re on the big league radar.

To me, the biggest breakout prospect in the farm system this year was RHP Deivi Garcia. The 19-year-old came into the season as a classic live arm/bad control prospect and suddenly he started throwing strikes. In 14 starts and 74 innings, mostly in Single-A but also one Double-A spot start, Garcia pitched to a 2.55 ERA (2.60 FIP) with 35.5% strikeouts and 6.8% walks. That is the fifth highest strikeout rate and fourth highest K-BB% rate among the 902 pitchers to throw at least 70 innings in the minors this year, and the best marks among teenagers.

Garcia is not the biggest guy at 5-foot-10 and 163 lbs., though he still has room to grow, and even if he can’t handle a starter’s workload long-term, his fastball/curveball combination is plenty good enough for the bullpen. He’s a high spin rate guy — the curveball has reportedly been clocked at 3,000+ rpm and that is super duper elite — and his changeup is better than you’d think. Garcia figuring out how to throw strikes this season is really exciting. This was his breakout year in the organization. Next season might be his breakout year on the global prospect map.

One of my favorite prospects in the system is RHP Roansy Contreras, a just turned 19-year-old kid who more than held his own when pushed to Low-A Charleston late in the season. Contreras had a 2.42 ERA (3.70 FIP) with 24.0% strikeouts and 8.4% walks in 12 starts and 63.1 innings this season, mostly with the RiverDogs but also some with Short Season Staten Island. A teenager with three quality pitches (fastball, curveball, changeup) and command and pitching know-how deserves more prospect love. Roansy has a chance to be awfully good.

RHP Trevor Stephan and RHP Garrett Whitlock, two 2017 draftees, carved up Single-A hitters this summer and reached Double-A. Stephan had a 3.69 ERA (3.60 FIP) with 26.8% strikeouts and 7.3% walks in 124.1 total innings this year. He’s a stuff guy with mid-90s gas and a hard slider. Whitlock is more of a pitchability guy with four pitches (four-seamer, sinker, slider, changeup). He had a 1.86 ERA (3.01 FIP) with 24.9% strikeouts and 8.4% walks in 120.2 innings this year. King and Whitlock had the second lowest and fourth lowest ERAs, respectively, among the 510 pitchers to throw at least 100 innings in the minors this year.

Thanks to some mechanical tweaks IF Brandon Wagner swatted 21 home runs this season after hitting 19 total from 2015-17. His ground ball rates the last four years: 51.4%, 46.5%, 45.5%, 35.6%. Hmmm. Wagner was far better with High-A Tampa (.270/.376/.510 and 154 wRC+) than Double-A Trenton (.262/.290/.346 and 116 wRC+) this year, but he’s a left-handed hitter with some thump who can play first, third, and a little second. The Yankees rolled the dice and left him unprotected in the Rule 5 Draft, which I don’t think is a big deal. Even if he gets picked, he’ll probably come back. I’m curious to see whether the power and air ball tendencies stick this year.

The International Arrivals

The Yankees spent a lot of money during the 2017-18 international signing period — they had some cash to spend after getting spurned by Shohei Ohtani — and they brought many of those 2017-18 international signees stateside this past season. Usually these kids spend a year cutting their teeth in the Dominican Summer League, even the high-profile ones, but not this year. The Yankees had many of them make their pro debuts in the rookie Gulf Coast and Appalachian Leagues. That’s quite a jump.

OF Everson Pereira received a $1.5M bonus last July and the Yankees sent him right to Rookie Pulaski, where he hit .263/.322/.389 (88 wRC+) with three homers and a 32.8% strikeout rate in 41 games. The numbers are not good, obviously, but he was essentially a high school junior playing against college kids fresh out of the draft. “He doesn’t have any 70- or 80-grade tools, but some scouts were confident enough to put future plus grades on his hit, run and raw power already. They also saw a (plus) defender in center field,” said a recent Baseball America scouting report. Periera may be a year way from top 100 prospect status.

The Yankees gave OF Antonio Cabello a $1.35M bonus with their leftover Ohtani money and they immediately moved him from catcher to center field. He’s a very good runner and a good athlete, and he was rough behind the plate defensively, so it made sense to move him to center. He can be an asset out there and the bat will be ready long before his defense at catcher. Cabello hit .308/.427/.522 (168 wRC+) with five homers, a 20.8% strikeout rate, and a 14.8% walk rate in 46 GCL games, and his hitting acumen has drawn Vlad Guerrero Jr. and Juan Soto comparisons. Huh. Cabello dislocated his non-throwing shoulder diving for a ball late in the season and needed surgery, but he’s expected back early next year. Bummer, but the tools are incredibly exciting.

OF Raimfer Salinas received $1.85M in leftover Ohtani money last year and he’s more tooled up than Cabello. He’s a standout defensive center fielder with excellent bat speed and power potential from the right side. Salinas played only eleven GCL games this year because he damaged a finger ligament on a slide, but he’ll be ready to go next year. 2B Ezequiel Duran signed for a mere $10,000 last July and he stunk with Pulaski this year, hitting .201/.251/.311 (48 wRC+) with a 27.7% strikeout rate in 53 games, but he’s an exit velocity monster who’s been praised for his innate hitting ability. Duran wouldn’t be the first guy to figure it out after a poor pro debut.

OF Anthony Garcia ($500,000 bonus) is built like a tank (6-foot-5 and 204 lbs.) and he led the GCL with ten homers in only 44 games this summer. He also struck out in 40.6% (!) of his plate appearances, but a switch-hitter with this kind of power? That’s worth a $500,000 roll of the dice all day, every day. SS Roberto Chirinos ($900,000) is a slick-fielding shortstop with good bat-to-ball skills. He got the bat knocked out of his hands a bit in the GCL though (.238/.289/.337 and 79 wRC+). Pereira and Salinas are 17. Cabello, Garcia, and Chirinos all recently turned 18. Duran is 19. These dudes are the next wave of top prospects, especially Pereira, Cabello, and Salinas.

The Trade Chips

The Yankees had an active trade deadline this year and, more recently, they used Sheffield as the headliner in the Paxton trade. Also sent to Seattle were RHP Erik Swanson and OF Dom Thompson-Williams. Swanson had a 3.86 ERA (3.64 FIP) with 26.8% strikeouts and 4.8% walks in 72.1 Triple-A innings this year and he has a classic back-end starter profile as a fastball/slider/changeup guy. Thompson-Williams became a launch angle guy this year and hit .299/.363/.546 (157 wRC+) with 22 homers in 100 Single-A games. He hit six homers from 2016-17. Swanson’s a nice depth arm. I’m curious to see how the launch angle thing works for Thompson-Williams in Double-A this year. Both guys are nice prospects who were expendable to the Yankees.

At the actual trade deadline, the Yankees shipped three pitching prospects to the Orioles for Zach Britton: RHP Cody Carroll, LHP Josh Rogers, and RHP Dillon Tate (season reviews). Tate is easily the best prospect of the three and he still has work to do to refine his command. He had a 3.38 ERA (3.78 FIP) before the trade and a 5.75 ERA (4.14 FIP) after the trade, all in the Double-A Eastern League. Being a pitcher in need of development in the Orioles system is a bad place to be. Poor Dillon. OF Billy McKinney (season review) was sent to the Blue Jays in the J.A. Happ trade along with Brandon Drury. He hit .226/.299/.495 (120 wRC+) with Triple-A Scranton before the trade while repeating the level. Eh.

In late August the Yankees used IF Abi Avelino and RHP Juan De Paula to get Andrew McCutchen from the Giants. Avelino bounced between Double-A and Triple-A for the second straight season and hit .287/.333/.446 (117 wRC+) with 15 homers in 123 games before the trade, which represents the best season of his career. Avelino is a classic utility type who went 3-for-11 (.273) as a September call-up with San Francisco. De Paula had a 1.71 ERA (3.46 FIP) with 23.4% strikeouts in 47.1 innings before the trade. He repeated Short Season Staten Island as a 21-year-old, which was kinda weird to me. I get the feeling the Yankees were down on the kid, which probably led to the trade.

The Yankees turned longtime organizational arm LHP Caleb Frare into international bonus money in a trade with the White Sox in July. The 25-year-old had a 0.81 ERA (2.23 FIP) with 33.3% strikeouts and 8.6% walks in 44.2 relief innings, almost all at Double-A before the trade, then he struck out nine in seven innings as a September call-up with Chicago. Good for him. Oft-injured RHP Drew Finley went to the Dodgers for Tim Locastro a few weeks ago. Finley’s father works in Los Angeles’ front office, so the trade is something of a homecoming for him.

Aside from Tate, the best prospect the Yankees traded at the deadline this year is little known RHP Luis Rijo. He went to the Twins in the Lance Lynn trade with Tyler Austin. The 20-year-old had a 2.77 ERA (2.50 FIP) with 19.5% strikeouts and 1.5% walks in 39 innings before the trade and a 1.27 ERA (3.85 FIP) with 20.5% strikeouts and 4.8% walks in 21.1 innings after the trade, all in short season leagues. Rijo is a fastball/curveball/changeup guy and Baseball America recently said “his tremendous feel for locating the baseball should give him a chance to become a backend starter.” Having a multitude of Luis Rijos in the system to use as trade deadline fodder is an underrated strength of the farm system. The Yankees are loaded with these guys.

The Busted Prospects

“Busted” is probably too harsh here, but, as always, several prospects in the system had tough 2018 seasons. There are always going to be injuries and poor performances. That’s baseball. RHP Freicer Perez struggled in six starts with High-A Tampa (21 runs and 19 walks in 25 innings) before having season-ending surgery to remove bone spurs from his shoulder. The good news is his rotator cuff and labrum (and capsule) were not damaged. The bad news is 2018 was a lost season for Perez, one of the better pitching prospects in the system.

RHP Albert Abreu, the best right-handed pitching prospect in the system coming into the season, missed more time with elbow problems and posted a 5.20 ERA (4.75 FIP) with 22.7% strikeouts and 9.8% walks in 72.2 innings at mostly High-A. Abreu has really good stuff — it’s an upper-90s fastball with a knockout curveball — but he’s thrown only 126 innings in two years since coming over in the Brian McCann trade, and we’ve yet to see him truly dominant for an extended period of time. Abreu has ability but he’s just kinda spinning his wheels right now.

RHP Luis Medina stayed healthy all season but lordy was it bad. The 19-year-old threw 36 innings with Rookie Pulaski and pitched to a 6.25 ERA (6.46 FIP) with 25.5% strikeouts and 25.0% walks. That is 47 strikeouts and 46 walks in 36 innings. Yuuup. Medina’s stuff is electric — it’s a Dellin Betances caliber fastball and breaking ball — and he has the highest ceiling of any pitcher in the organization. But the poor kid has no idea where the ball is going right now. Like Dellin, he’s gonna be a long-term project.

The two best middle infield prospects in the organization, SS Thairo Estrada and SS Kyle Holder, had brutal seasons. Estrada got shot during a robbery in January and also battled wrist and back trouble during the season. He was limited to 18 regular season games and had the bullet removed from his hip in June. Thairo did heal up in time to play in the Arizona Fall League. Holder fractured a vertebrae in Spring Training and missed two months, and then missed three weeks with a concussion later in the season. He also went home for two weeks at midseason after his brother passed away. Holder played 48 games this year.

3B Dermis Garcia continued to flash big power (15 homers in 88 Low-A games) and big swing-and-miss issues (30.6% strikeouts), and the Yankees had him throw some bullpen sessions to see how he looked on the mound. Dermis never did appear in a game as a pitcher though. SS Hoy Jun Park had a much better season that you may realize — he hit .258/.387/.349 (122 wRC+) with 18 steals and nearly as many walks (16.2%) as strikeouts (16.4%) in 103 High-A games — but the Yankees are still waiting for the $1.2M bonus kid to take that big step forward developmentally.

RHP Chance Adams (season review) underwhelmed while repeating Triple-A (4.78 ERA and 4.87 FIP) and is at something of a career crossroads. Early next season might be his last chance to prove he can hack it as a starter. The Yankees have kept him at arm’s length thus far — his lone big league start was an emergency spot start when Happ went down with hand, foot, and mouth disease. RHP Domingo Acevedo (season review) again battled injuries and was limited to 69.1 innings.

Other Notable Prospects

Almost exactly one year to the day after being selected in the first round of the 2017 draft, RHP Clarke Schmidt completed his Tommy John surgery rehab and made his pro debut. He managed a 3.09 ERA (2.61 FIP) with 33.0% strikeouts and 6.6% walks in 23.1 closely monitored innings in his return, and by all accounts his stuff looked pretty good. Like his pre-Tommy John surgery stuff, basically. Schmidt’s season came to an end in late August with what has been reported as a non-arm injury. Not sure what’s going on there.

RHP Matt Sauer, last year’s second round pick, had a weird season with Short Season Staten Island, statistically. He threw more strikes than I expected (6.4% walks) and missed way fewer bats than I expected (15.9% strikeouts and 7.1% swings and misses). The Yankees helped Sauer improve his delivery and tempo and it’s possible this year’s statistical weirdness can be attributed to him adjusting to his new mechanics. I dunno. We’ll see what happens next year.

RHP Nick Green is one of my favorite prospects in the system. I find him fascinating. He has this funky cutter/sinker hybrid fastball that helped him lead the minors with a 66.4% ground ball rate (min. 130 IP) by nearly five percentage points this season. Green doesn’t have much else to work with aside from the, uh, cut-sinker (?), but if you’re only going to have one pitch, a dominant ground ball (cut-)sinker is a good pitch to have. Green threw 132.2 innings with a 3.32 ERA (4.28 FIP) with 17.7% strikeouts and 11.1% walks this season, with most of that coming with High-A Tampa.

Easy to overlook in the pitching ranks is RHP Nick Nelson, who quietly sits in the mid-to-upper-90s with his fastball and features a hammer power curveball. This season he threw 121.1 innings, mostly at High-A Tampa, with a 3.55 ERA (3.12 FIP) and high walk (12.1%) and strikeout (27.5%) rates. Nelson had the 37th most strikeouts (144) and also the 27th most walks (63) in the minors this year. I’m not sure the control or third pitch will ever be there for him to start long-term. I sure am interested to see what Nelson can do in short one-inning relief bursts though.

OF Isiah Gilliam might belong in the “Busted Prospects” section — again, “busted” may be too harsh — after hitting .256/.313/.397 (103 wRC+) with 13 homers in 125 High-A games this year. He had a 137 wRC+ with 21.7% strikeouts and 10.8% walks in Low-A last season. This season it was a 103 wRC+ with 29.0% strikeouts and 6.9% walks in High-A. SS Diego Castillo didn’t hit much with High-A Tampa (.260/.307/.324 and 83 wRC+) but he makes a ton of contact (9.1% strikeouts and 6.1% swings and misses) and can play the hell out of shortstop. I hope the bat catches up to the glove soon.

RHP Luis Gil and RHP Juan Then are on opposite ends of the pitching prospect spectrum in terms of style. Gil is a straight grip it and rip it guy who touched 101 mph this season and registers strong spin rates on his curveball. The 20-year-old struck out 68 batters in 46 short season innings this year. He also walked 31. Then, 18, already has three good pitches (fastball, curveball, changeup) and a plan on the mound. The kid is 6-foot-1 and 155 lbs. right now and the Yankees are hoping his low-90s heater becomes a mid-to-upper-90s heater as he matures. Then had a 2.70 ERA (3.22 FIP) with 21.5% strikeouts and 5.6% walks in 50 GCL innings in 2018.

RHP Stephen Tarpley (season review) led the minors with a 68.1% ground ball rate (min. 65 IP) this season and earned himself both a September call-up and a spot on the ALDS roster. RHP Joe Harvey was untouchable as Triple-A Scranton’s closer this year, pitching to a 1.66 ERA (2.49 FIP) with 28.5% strikeouts and 9.8% walks in 54.1 innings for the RailRiders. The Yankees added him to the 40-man roster to protect him from the Rule 5 Draft last month. We’re going to see these two dudes in the big league bullpen next year, even if they’re only shuttle guys.

The 2018 Draft

Last season’s 91-71 record gave the Yankees the 23rd overall pick in the 2018 draft, which they used on C Anthony Seigler (prospect profile). He’s the best prospect the Yankees drafted this year (duh) followed by second rounder C Josh Breaux (prospect profile) and fourth rounder RHP Frank German (prospect profile). Here are my Day One, Day Two, and Day Three draft recaps.

Among the late round picks, RHP Rodney Hutchison (sixth round) created some buzz right before the draft because his fastball ticked up and he showed an improved slider. He had a 1.97 ERA (3.02 FIP) with very good strikeout (24.4%), walk (4.7%), and ground ball (64.4%) rates in 32 innings with Short Season Staten Island in his pro debut. RHP Tanner Myatt (11th round) opened some eyes with his 97-99 mph heater and hard slider after turning pro. He struck out 22 in 18.1 mostly rookie ball innings.

While the high picks like Seigler and Breaux get all the attention and understandably so — my money is on Seigler being the consensus No. 1 prospect in the system at this time next year — the late rounds are where the Yankees have built their farm system depth. Guys like Rogers (11th), Whitlock (18th round), and Carroll (22nd round) were all unheralded Day Three picks in recent years who developed into solid prospects and, in Rogers’ and Carroll’s case, trade chips. A year from now we might be talking about Hutchison and Myatt as the next late round success stories.

The Best of the Rest

The Yankees have more minor leaguers under contract that any other team. That doesn’t necessarily mean they have more prospects. It just means they have more minor leaguers. As J.J. Cooper explained in August, the Yankees have nine minor league affiliates and thus can have roughly 340 players under contract. Most other organizations only have six or seven minor league affiliates, and can carry around 290 contracts. Those extra 50 (!) roster spots mean the Yankees have more innings and at-bats to play with, and more spots for lottery tickets.

Although the farm system isn’t nearly as robust now as it was a year or two ago, the Yankees do still have a pretty deep system, especially in arms. Here are the last few notables worth mentioning as part of our farm system review:

OF Trey Amburgey: Righty hitter and thrower has some pop and authored an underwhelming .258/.300/.418 (97 wRC+) line with Double-A Trenton this year.
SS Oswaldo Cabrera: The tools are all there but the production is not. Cabrera hit .229/.273/.320 (70 wRC+) with a 12.5% strikeout rate with Low-A Charleston this year.
RHP Rony Garcia: Cutter specialist reached High-A at age 20 this year and posted solid strikeout (21.0%) and walk (5.5%) rates in 119 innings. Deivi pulled away as the system’s best Garcia though.
RHP Yoendrys Gomez: Mid-90s fastball and a rainbow curveball produced a 2.08 ERA (3.57 FIP) and 25.8% strikeouts in 47.2 rookie ball innings this summer. Someone to watch.
RHP Nolan Martinez: Finally stayed healthy and threw 61.2 innings with 3.36 ERA (4.19 FIP) this year. He threw 20.2 innings total from 2016-17. Next year will be a big one.
OF Pablo Olivares: Personal favorite hit .322/.391/.442 (142 wRC+) in 70 Single-A games before an unknown injury ended his season in July. That’s too bad.
RHP Glenn Otto: Last year’s fifth rounder showed a dynamite fastball/curveball combination in his two starts before needing season-ending surgery to treat a blood clot in his shoulder.
OF Alex Palma: Built on last year’s breakout with a .299/.348/.459 (132 wRC+) line in 52 High-A games. He suffered a season-ending injury in an outfield collision in July.

I’m looking forward to full seasons of Gomez and Martinez next year and I want to see how Olivares, Otto, and Palma rebound from their injuries. Especially Otto and especially especially Olivares. He’s not a star prospect like the stat line would lead you to believe, but he can do everything well. Just a solid all-around ballplayer. Had he not gotten hurt, the 20-year-old Olivares might’ve finished the season in Double-A and been added to the 40-man roster after the season. Instead, the Yankees are gambling no team will take an injured Single-A outfielder in the Rule 5 Draft.

What’s Next?

As was the case last year, the farm system now is worse than it was in March, and for good reason. The Yankees graduated two high-end prospects to the big leagues in Torres and Andujar, and they used several others in trades, most notably Sheffield and Tate. If the farm system is going to take a hit, you want it to take a hit because guys are graduating and being traded for MLB help, and that’s what happened with the Yankees.

Barring a fire sale — the Yankees might get prospects for Sonny Gray but otherwise they aren’t selling veterans anytime soon — it is awfully tough for the Yankees to build a farm system now. They have back of the first round draft picks (30th overall in 2019) and the draft and international spending restrictions level the playing field. The Yankees added some very exciting international kids (Pereira, Cabello) and new draftees (Seigler) to the system this year. It’ll take a year or two before they develop into foundational prospects, however. Fortunately the farm system has already done its part strengthening the MLB team.

Garrett Whitlock is emerging as the Yankees’ latest find in the late rounds of the draft

May 22, 2018 by Mike Leave a Comment

The Yankees currently own the best record (31-13) and second best run differential (+81) in baseball, largely because their farm system has been so productive. Luis Severino, Gary Sanchez, and Aaron Judge are all legitimate stars and it sure looks like Gleyber Torres is on a similar path. Miguel Andujar, Chad Green, Jordan Montgomery, Domingo German, and others have come up to contribute within the last year or two as well.

Even with all the recent graduations to the big leagues — Andujar exceeded the 130 at-bat rookie limit last week and Torres will do the same in about two weeks — the Yankees still have a strong farm system built mostly around pitching. They’ve turned a lot of mid-to-late round draft picks and smaller bonus international prospects into legitimate prospects. Severino was a small bonus guy ($225,000) and he’s a bona fide ace. Montgomery was a fourth round pick and he’s a legitimate MLB starter.

Consider some of the recent mid-to-late round draft picks the Yankees have turned into prospects who are either helping at the MLB level now or could be soon:

2016: Taylor Widener (12th round) blossomed into a top 30 prospect and was traded for Brandon Drury. Also, Trevor Lane (10th round) is one of the team’s best reliever prospects.
2015: Chance Adams (5th round), Josh Rogers (11th round), and Cody Carroll (22nd round) are currently in Triple-A and on the cusp of the big leagues.
2014: Montgomery (4th round) and Jonathan Holder (6th round) are big leaguers, and Matt Wotherspoon (34th round) developed well enough to be traded for international bonus money.
2013: Nick Rumbelow (7th round), Tyler Webb (10th round), Caleb Smith (14th round), and Nestor Cortes (36th round) have all pitched in the big leagues.

That’s a lot of mid-to-late round picks turning into useful pieces. Every team turns one or two mid-to-late rounders into useful prospects every few years. The Yankees are doing it year after year though. The high draft picks get all the attention and understandably so, but the mid-to-late round picks are where you build depth, and I’m not sure any team has done a better job turning those non-premium draft picks into quality prospects than the Yankees.

Already the next mid-to-late rounder turned legitimate prospect is beginning to emerge. Right-hander Garrett Whitlock, last year’s 18th round pick, currently owns a 0.98 ERA (2.19 FIP) with excellent strikeout (30.2%), walk (4.7%), and ground ball (60.7%) rates in eight starts and 46 innings. He started the season with Low-A Charleston and was promoted to High-A Tampa last week, and threw six scoreless innings in his Tampa debut.

There are 302 pitchers in the minors who have thrown at least 40 innings this season, and among those 302, Whitlock has the eighth highest ground ball rate (60.7%) and the 52nd highest swing-and-miss rate (12.9%). Only three of those 302 pitchers have a higher ground ball rate and a higher swing-and-miss rate than Whitlock. In the super early going, he’s shown an impressive ability to get grounders and whiffs.

The Yankees selected Whitlock with the 542nd overall pick last year — Baseball America ranked him the 331st best prospect in the draft class — and paid him an above-slot $247,500 bonus for two reasons. One, he was a draft-eligible sophomore with more negotiating leverage than the usual college player. And two, Whitlock was considered a potential Day Two pick (rounds 3-10) before a back problem slowed him last spring. The Yankees saw him at his best in the Cape Cod League two years ago and before his back flared up, and rolled the dice.

When Andujar exceeded the rookie at-bat limit last week and lost his prospect eligibility, Whitlock slid into MLB.com’s top 30 Yankees prospect list. Here’s a piece of their scouting report:

As an amateur, Whitlock’s best weapon was a two-seam fastball in the low 90s with sink. New York has introduced him to a four-seamer to work the upper portion of the strike zone, and he has shown the ability to carry mid-90s velocity into the late innings. He also has a breaking ball with the power of a slider and the depth of a curveball, as well as a changeup that counteracts left-handers … He has exceeded expectations early in his pro career and has the upside of a mid-rotation starter.

Already the Yankees have changed the scouting report. Whitlock was a low-90s two-seamer guy in college and now he’s sitting in the mid-90s and pitching upstairs with a four-seamer. In two years at Alabama-Birmingham, Whitlock posted an 18.3% strikeout rate. In eleven months as a pro, he has a 32.0% strikeout rate. Good health, increased velocity, and a new four-seamer he can elevate for swings and misses explains that.

Words on nice, pictures are better, and video is best. Thanks to the magic of the internet, here is every pitch from Whitlock’s start last week with Tampa, his High-A debut:

Whitlock has a lower arm slot and a little funk in his delivery — despite that arm slot, his platoon split is not big at all, righties are hitting .172/.209/.264 against him and lefties are at .178/.241/.247 — and who knows whether he can stick as a starter with that arm slot long-term. We’ll find out in time. For now, the most important thing is Whitlock is healthy and he’s taken to his new fastball well, raising his prospect stock.

The Yankees blend scouting and analytics very well and, going into last year’s draft, I have no doubt they identified Whitlock as someone who could see velocity gains in pro ball and benefit from an adjustment in pitch selection, specifically mixing in a few four-seamers with all those two-seamers. And so far it is working wonderfully. His back is healthy, his velocity has ticked up, and the performance has been great. Less than a year after the draft, Whitlock is already beginning to emerge as another mid-to-late round success story for the Yankees.

DotF: Mateo extends hitting streak in Trenton’s win

July 7, 2017 by Mike Leave a Comment

Got a bunch of notes to get us started:

Baseball America released their midseason top 100 prospects list earlier today. Seven Yankees made it: SS Gleyber Torres (3rd), OF Blake Rutherford (36th), OF Clint Frazier (48th), RHP Chance Adams (55th), OF Estevan Florial (70th), LHP Justus Sheffield (72nd), and OF Dustin Fowler (88th). I’ll have some thoughts on this next week.
The Yankees signed Alabama-Birmingham RHP Garrett Whitlock (18th round) to a $247,500 bonus, reports Jim Callis. That is over the $125,000 slot for each pick after the tenth round, so the remaining $122,500 counts against the bonus pool. The signing deadline was 4pm ET today. Here is our Draft Pool tracker.
1B Mike Ford (hamstring) and RHP Ronald Herrera (shoulder) were placed on the Triple-A Scranton disabled list, the team announced. Ford isn’t expected to be out long. Also, RHP Bryan Mitchell was sent from Triple-A Scranton to High-A Tampa. That allows him to make a start next week during the Triple-A All-Star break.
Two Yankees made Baseball America’s Prospect Team of the Month for June and they are not among the team’s top prospects: 2B Nick Solak and RHP Zack Littell. Hooray farm system depth! Solak hit .392/.453/.595 (204 wRC+) with three homers in June. Goodness. Littell had a 0.58 ERA (1.92 FIP) in 31 innings.
A bunch of Yankees made this week’s Prospect Hot Sheet: SS Jorge Mateo (7th), RHP Dillon Tate (8th), RHP Jorge Guzman (11th), and OF Billy McKinney (16th). That’s a good sign. Mateo, Tate, and McKinney are trying to rebuild prospect stock right now while Guzman is trying to establish his.

Triple-A Scranton (4-1 loss to Lehigh Valley)

CF Jake Cave: 1-4, 1 K
3B Miguel Andujar: 0-4, 1 K
RF Billy McKinney: 0-3, 1 K
SS Abe Avelino: 0-3
RHP Chance Adams: 5 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 6 K, 3/4 GB/FB — 62 of 95 pitches were strikes (65%) … he’s walked at least three batters in seven of his 17 starts this year, which is a few too many
RHP J.P. Feyereisen: 2.2 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 2 K, 2/2 GB/FB — 28 of 44 pitches were strikes (64%)
RHP Gio Gallegos: 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K, 0/1 GB/FB — 14 of 21 pitches were strikes

[Read more…]