J.J. Cooper MLB Prospects Chat (8/10/21)

Image credit: (Photo by Eddie Kelly)

Trey (Arkansas):

 ETA on MJ Melendez, he’s stuck in the royals system behind Salvy. When does he get his shot?

J.J. Cooper: Hey everyone. Glad we could chat today. To jump right in. He’s a catcher, so I would say 2022 is a reasonable ETA. There’s nothing lost by letting him get comfortable in AAA (where he just arrived). As far as being stuck, he’s a catcher. Many, many teams play two catchers, especially in a league with a DH. Here’s a look at the 60+ win AL teams for 2021 and how many PAs that team’s second C has gotten. We’re just under 70 percent of the way through the season, so expect to see these numbers grow by another 30 percent (or more in some cases) by the end of the year. 1. TB. Francisco Mejia (192) 2. BOS. Kevin Plawecki (106) 3. NYY. Kyle Higiashioka (134) 4. TOR. Danny Jansen (140) weird case as 3 guys have 70+ and no one has 170 5. CWS. Zack Collins (185) 6. HOU. Jason Castro (132) 7. OAK. Aramis Garcia (94) So there are a number of examples of how a No. 2 C could get 250-300 PAs. I think it’s possible that the Royals could work Melendez in while still getting Perez plenty of PAs.

Andy (Cincinnati):

 Two questions: 1. When does Bobby Witt Jr. get promoted to the Royals? To me, it seems like he doesn’t have much more to prove. 2. Very similarly, the same question for Jose Barrero of the Reds. Do you see him getting a promotion to the big leagues in the next month or so? Kyle Farmer is playing well as of late, but he’s also been playing hurt and Barrero has shown he’s developing the hitting and power tools that have been the big question mark.

J.J. Cooper: Let’s start with Witt. I am going to disagree with you on him not having much left to gain from time in the minors. He just got to AAA. He still has less than 500 MiLB ABs in total. If Witt spent the entire rest of the MiLB season in AAA, that would not be an unreasonable development path. He’s been great so far in AAA (and was great in AA). But I don’t think it would be slowing him down to say he opens the 2022 season as the Royals SS and not before. Him coming up later this season doesn’t massively speed his development. For Barrero, his issues he had when he sped to the majors in 2020 are still there, just to a lessened degree. If he’s called up right now, he may still struggle with sliders off the plate. He would be rangier than Farmer though and yes, he’s definitely more ready than he was in 2020. I could see the case for bringing Barrero up to help boost the Reds in their playoff chase, but there is some benefit in letting Barrero add the final bits of polish in AAA.

Rich (NJ):

 Mark Vientos has been out of the lineup but if continues to hit well when he returns do you think the Mets would call him up to see if he could provide a spark to their offense ?

J.J. Cooper: Not yet. Give him a little more time. Big power, but asking him to jump straight to the majors right now is a little aggressive IMO.

Steve (NY):

 What would you say the hardest part of putting together midseason 30s this year was?

J.J. Cooper: The insanity that was July. Trying to put them together and report for those lists as deeply as possible while also covering the draft, Futures Game, trade deadline and everything else (magazine, etc.) meant July was a month without a moment’s break. That said, it’s important to us to get our 30s updated as much as possible by the midseason trade deadline. I don’t want that to sound whiny or asking for sympathy. We’re VERY fortunate to get to do this as full-time baseball writers. Thank you to all of you subscribers for providing the support that allows us to do this. As far as the more nuts and bolts pieces of putting together the 30s, it’s trying to be properly reactive without overdoing it. Players are way different in some cases to what they were pre-COVID (for good and bad). Sussing out which players have really changed and which ones have had good or bad starts that will dissipate, that’s been a bigger challenge than usual.

Matthew (Toronto):

 What kind of upside are we looking at with Gabriel Moreno?

J.J. Cooper: Massive. When we were doing our midseason calls, we did talk to evaluators who would argue ranking him ahead of Adley Rutschman. We’re not going there, but that is something we heard on multiple occasions.

Justin (Tucson, AZ):

 I was surprised to see that Heriberto Hernandez and Elijah Tatis weren’t top 30 prospects for their teams. Also surprised that Jose Miranda isn’t even a top 100.

J.J. Cooper: Hernandez runs into a numbers game. We would like to rank at least 35-40 prospects in the Rays Top 30. That is still a very deep system. Tatis is just getting his feet wet, but he hasn’t hit yet in his very, very brief pro career. As far as Miranda, the fact that he is in the Top 100 discussion is notable in itself. Coming out of last year, he wasn’t even viewed as a player who needed protecting from the Rule 5 draft. Now he may be in Minnesota in 2022.

Jeff (Idaho):

 Lets talk Michael Harris. Do scouts think he’ll develop 20-hr power to go with his other skills? Better long-run player than Waters and Pache? Top 10 prospect next year?

J.J. Cooper: Yes. Harris has significant power potential. He already can put on a show in BP (he did at the Futures Game) and his best exit velocities in games are exceptional. He isn’t showing that plus power in games all too often just yet, but it’s there and I would expect we will see it more as he matures and develops. Top 10 Prospect in the game next year? That seems a little rich to me, but Top 25? Very possible.

Erik (Chicago):

 Not a prospect question but when can we get some T-Shirts or Hats with the generic BA logo? I need to rep next time I go to the ballpark

J.J. Cooper: Send me an email (jj.cooper (at) baseballamerica.com). I’m going to be looking into this over the next couple of months.

Mark (DC):

 Assessing the return on the Scherzer/Turner blockbuster — how should we be thinking of Keibert Ruiz? Potential franchise cornerstone, useful major league regular, somewhere in between?

J.J. Cooper: Useful MLB regular who may make some All-Star Games. That would be a great return. He’s a C, so I would say there’s a little wider range of variance than there would be if Ruiz was an OF or middle INF.

Tim (SLC):

 I’m not sure I can even articulate this question correctly–but do you think there’s any gamesmanship that goes on with the way scouts report information to draft publications, like Baseball America? For example, the Royals scout may be reluctant to pound the table for Mozzicato to try and avoid directing unwanted attention his way?

J.J. Cooper: Absolutely. But that’s why we make sure we talk to a ton of scouts/front office officials with a ton of different teams. Imagine a player draws a wide range of opinions. If we had truth serum and we talked to every team, we may find this player ranges from the 15th to the 45th best player in the draft class depending on the team/evaluation. If we talked to one team, we may end up ranking that player 15th (we only talked to the team highest on the player) or 45th (lowest team). But if we talk to multiple sources in multiple organizations, we get 15-20 from one team, 18-23 from another, 20-25 from 2-3 other teams, 30-35 from another and 40 from one. And we rank the player say 23rd. Well, there are teams who liked the player better than that. And others who didn’t like the player that much. But we’re reflecting a consensus viewpoint on the player.

Mike (Bayarea):

 Hello jj, I know it’s early, but are zac veen Benny Montgomery the future outfield of the rockies

J.J. Cooper: I sure hope so. Because if they are not, it’s going to be very cold in Denver for a very long time. The sad reality is in that division with three powers (LAD, SFG and SD), the path for Colorado to get back to contention seems to be a very long one.

Big Rig Jake (Atlanta, GA):

 Is MacKenzie Gore still a top 100 prospect?

J.J. Cooper: We kept him in there in our midseason Top 100, but as we wrote in a corresponding piece, Gore is still in the 100 based on the potential he’ll get back to what he was a couple of years ago. Based purely on what scouts are seeing in 2021, he would not be on the 100. https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/2021-top-100-mlb-prospects-rising-falling-and-just-missing-our-midseason-update/

daffy (hawaii):

 jordan walker vs nolan gorman? Pros and cons on both?

J.J. Cooper: Ceiling: Walker. Floor: Gorman. Tools: Walker I am fascinated by Walker. A year from now he could be much higher in our Top 100.

daffy (hawaii):

 your latest assessment on mackenzie gore?

J.J. Cooper: Hoping he figures it out (we root for prospects), but the stuff, the delivery and the command are all a notch or two or three below what he was at his best.

Dylan (Toronto):

 With the trades of Austin Martin and Nick Madrigal at (arguably) “below” value, are we seeing a trend in (some) teams moving away from contact-but-without-much-pop players?

J.J. Cooper: I think those trades were both basically at value, but there has been a long-run of reluctance of the value of contact-without-pop players. I just quickly did a search for the hardest to strikeout players from 2010 and then looked for the players among the toughest to K (under a 7.0% K rate) who had an isolated power under .110. Jeff Keppinger (6.3% K rate with a .105 ISO) Juan Pierre (6.4% with a .040 ISO) Alberto Callaspo (7.0% with a .109 ISO) Placido Polanco (7.8% with a .088 ISO) Let’s go back to 2000 Eric Young (5.7% with a .102 ISO) Fernando Vina (6.5% with a .099 ISO) Nice players, but if you look among the contact/no pop guys you find nice players. OK, let’s flip it. Highest K-rates among batting qualifiers 2010 Mark Reynolds Adam Dunn Drew Stubbs Adam LaRoche Colby Rasmus Carlos Pena 2000 Preston Wilson Richie Sexson Jim Edmonds Mo Vaughn Jim Thome. A lot more long-term value there IMO.

J.J. Cooper: Thanks everyone. Sorry I need to run, but we have to get our midseason Org Talent Rankings update finished.