Minor League Monitor: Chat Excerpts from Keith Law's Top 25 Midseason Prospects

Keith Law gave us the first update of the season to his top 25 prospects list, with Orioles' top prospect Dylan Bundy at the top of the class. You can find the whole article here (Insider req'd), but he also led a chat on Thursday as well. Here's his new top 10 prospects:

You can find my thoughts below, as well as some excerpts from the chat itself after the jump.

• The minors are really heavy with pitching prospects at the moment, as 6 of Law's top 10 are all pitchers. There are 5 more in the rest of his top 25, and that number could rise depending on how pitchers like Matt Barnes, Zach Lee, and Aaron Sanchez progress this season (all were on Law's honorable mention list).
• The jumps by both Francisco Lindor and Nick Castellanos point towards mid-season promotions for me, and I think it is interesting that he now has Castellanos ahead of Nolan Arenado.
• Mariners and Diamondbacks fans already knew this, but they should be very excited about the pitching coming. The Mariners had two starters and the Diamondbacks had three within the top 25.
• I was a bit surprised to see Bubba Starling remain where he was at during the preseason, and hopefully we will find out where he will be playing next soon.
• The jump of Zach Wheeler was a bit surprising to me, but very interesting. The impression I had received was that Harvey was the higher ceiling prospect, but it's clear that Wheeler has jumped ahead of him.

With that, here's some of the excerpts from the chat:

Jonesy (San Jose, CA): Correa > Javier Baez?

Klaw (1:12 PM): Yes.

Baez was a top 10 pick last year, and I clearly need to read more about Carlos Correa.

Tom (Lowell)

You tweeted earlier that you are in favor of trading draft picks. Would you put any restrictions on the process or just have it as a free market?

Klaw (1:20 PM)

I'd be fine with some loose restrictions so no one swings a Ditka/Ricky Williams deal, such as restricting teams to trading a maximum of three picks a year or something. But otherwise, laissez-faire.

I would love to see teams be able to do this in some shape or form, but MLB seems pretty adamant that they do not want it to happen as of now. Maybe on the next CBA?

Jonesy (San Jose, CA)

Rizzo's destroying AAA again. What do you make of his time in the bigs last year? SSS or is there something he can still learn in Iowa?

Klaw (1:23 PM)

They've made some adjustments to shorten the first part of his swing, and I think it's really helped him hit LH pitching.

I have been stashing Rizzo for a while now in my long-term keeper league, and it sounds like he may be called up as a part of the next round of Interleague play. He's been absolutely crushing it down in AAA, and it's good to hear that it might not be just playing int he PCL.

Jon V. (Cleveland, OH)

How do Profar, Machado and Lindor compare? How would you rank the three in each of the 5 major scouting categories?

Klaw (1:30 PM)

Profar and Lindor are no-doubt shortstops, both better runners than Machado. Machado is much bigger and I think he'll produce a lot more offense, but there's a non-negligible probability he moves to third base.

All three of them are progressing nicely at this point, and I would say that both Profar and Machado could reach the Majors for a cup of coffee by the end of the season. More likely they both would be up to stay some time during next season.

Mike (Boston)

Has your opinion on Matt Barnes changed since last June when he was drafted?

Klaw (1:49 PM)

My opinion hasn't changed so much as HE has changed, changing opinions among scouts. Had someone hang a John Smoltz comp on him. Nothing like having your first overall pick compared to a future HoFer

Extremely high praise for Barnes, but that's generally why we avoid making comps. Law later mentions that he thinks Barnes will be in AA within a month. Honestly, there's not a lot of reason not to keep pushing him.

Trey (Boston)

Is Tony Cingrani for real? Top 100 Consideration next year if he keeps it up?

Klaw (2:29 PM)

The arm action isn't exactly ideal. He's a prospect - he was my sleeper prospect for the Reds this year - but a lot of folks peg him as a reliever because of the delivery.

I've been thinking of writing about Cingrani and his rather ridiculous stat line in the California League, but it's not a great thing to hear that his upside might be relief.