Top 5 Hitting Prospects

by faketeams on Jan 2, 2009 3:00 PM EST in Baseball

In his Wedensday ESPN.com chat, Jim Callis of Baseball America ranked his top five hitting prospects. At the top is Baltimore Orioles catcher Matt Wieters followed by 3B Pedro Alvarez of Pittsburgh. St. Louis Cardinals' CF Colby Rasmus gets the bronze, and San Francisco Giants 2008 1st round pick, Buster Posey, finshes 4th.

None of those four are necessarily surprising, but the 5th ranked one took my by surprise. Mr. Callis chose Tampa Bay Rays' SS Tim Beckham. Other than being the Rays last pick in the top 5 for a while, Beckham didn't make the kind of professioanl debut (246/309/350) that would have had me thinking he ranked with any of the other four.

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Are the Tampa Bay Rays being giving favorable treatment now?

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No

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no Heyward?

or KLaw’s fave McCutchen? will be interesting to see how they rank them in the book.

raygu

by Ray Guilfoyle on Jan 2, 2009 3:10 PM EST reply actions

Prospects

There are so many players who appear to be better hitters that I couldn’t reach any conclusion but Rays bias. Is Beckham really a better hitting prospect than Travis Snider? Jesus Montero? Dexter Fowler? Jordan Schafer? Carlos Santana? Adn so on.

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by faketeams on Jan 3, 2009 8:30 AM EST reply actions

Why so highly rated

Here is a link to why Beckham is so highly rated. I couldn’t help thinking “Andrew McCutchen” as I read it.

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by faketeams on Jan 3, 2009 8:35 AM EST reply actions

s

when it comes to prospects,nobody knows,go year by year and you will see bust,good,bust good,bust good
http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prospects/rankings/top-100-prospects/all-time.html

by superherodj on Jan 3, 2009 10:14 PM EST reply actions

+1

Because of the bust inherent in prospecting, I think the Rays are getting positively biased treatment because the predictions have been correct so far, and that makes the prospecting pros feel good about themselves. A natural reaction but one that others need to be wary of.

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by faketeams on Jan 4, 2009 11:33 AM EST up reply actions